Ottorino Respighi

Antiche danze ed arie

Between 1917 and 1931 Ottorino Respighi harmonized and instrumented twelve works from the 16th- and 17th-century Italian and French lute literature and arranged the pieces into three 4-movement suites, under the title Antiche danze ed arie. He instrumented the first suite for chamber orchestra, the second for symphony orchestra and the third for strings. He also published six of the twelve movements in a piano arrangement. This publication in the Leggiero series is a 5-movement selection from the three suites, in making this free transcrip-tion, Árpád Pejtsik took account of both the orchestral and the piano versions. The level of difficulty of the works corresponds to thegeneral demands of the series. The viola part may also be played on a third violin.