(It.: ‘whim’, ‘fancy’; Fr. caprice).
The term has been used in a bewildering variety of ways. Works entitled ‘capriccio’ embrace a wide range of procedures and forms, as well as a great variety of performing media, vocal and instrumental. The word first appeared in the second half of the 16th century, and it was used almost immediately in connection with pieces of music (the earliest reference, applied by Jacquet de Berchem to a set of madrigals, is in 1561). The term was used, in the late 16th and early 17th centuries, for works in various media, including madrigals, music for voices or instruments, and instrumental pieces, particularly keyboard ones. According to Furetière (1690), ‘Capriccios are pieces of music, poetry or painting wherein the force of imagination has better success than observation of the rules of art’. ‘Capriccio’ does not signify a specific musical technique or structure, but rather a general disposition towards the exceptional, the whimsical, the fantastic and the apparently arbitrary.
In the early 17th century the keyboard capriccio, which like the ricercare, canzona and fantasia is an important ancestor of the fugue, is closely bound up with the composition techniques and performing directions discussed by Caccini and Frescobaldi, as well as with the aesthetics of the seconda pratica. The rules of counterpoint could be broken or even ignored for expressive reasons; rhythmic liberties, especially tempo fluctuation, were encouraged. Praetorius called the keyboard capriccio ‘phantasia subitanea’:
a sudden whim. One takes a subject, but deserts it for another whenever it comes into one’s mind so to do. One can add, take away, digress, turn and direct the music as one wishes, but while one is not strictly bound by the rules, one ought not go too much out of the mode.
The keyboard capriccios (c1590) of Giovanni de Macque exhibit sudden and violent changes of mood and style; some of them are a fantastic mixture of fugal imitations, chordal fanfares, expressive ornaments, dazzling passage-work and harsh dissonances. The subjects are presented in augmentation, diminution, inversion and with many rhythmic variants.
Frescobaldi said of his set of capriccios (1624): ‘In those passages which do not seem to conform to the rules of counterpoint, the player should seek out the affect and the composer's intentions’. His capriccios cannot be discussed as a group, as they differ so widely in treatment. A characteristic trait is that the subject that forms the basis for the musical discourse (mainly fugal imitations) is not worked out in any orderly fashion; the pieces tend to be sectional, with frequent changes of metre and tempo. In both his capriccios on the hexachord, for example, the subject undergoes kaleidoscopic transformations, including chromatic filling-in; it is used in fugal imitation, in close stretto, in familiar style and as a cantus firmus. La, sol, fa, mi, re, ut begins in a serious fugal style, but the last note of the subject is consistently raised chromatically, a bizarre touch characteristic of the capriccio. The keyboard capriccio continued well into the 18th century, in Germany as well as Italy: there are examples by Froberger, Poglietti, Kerll, F.T. Richter, Georg Reutter (i), Georg Böhm, Handel and J.S. Bach (bwv993), in most of which fugal procedure is followed.
The title ‘capriccio’, throughout the 17th century, often seems to imply identity with other forms or procedures, the title indicating the spirit of the music. Ascanio Mayone's two books of Diversi capricci (1603, 1609) contain no pieces entitled ‘capriccio’ but are collections of ricercares, canzonas, madrigal arrangements and other pieces; he advised his readers ‘not to be scandalized if they find the rules of counterpoint little observed’. G.M. Trabaci's Ricercate, & altre varij capricci (1615) is a collection of toccatas, ricercares, galliards and partitas; his readers are asked to pay attention to the spirit of the music. Other composers identified the capriccio and the fantasia with the canzona, e.g. Ottavio Bariolla in Capricci, overo Canzoni (1594) and Banchieri in Fantasie, overo Canzoni alla francese (1603).
‘Capriccio’ is also used as a dance title, as well as a title for a collection of dances, in the 17th and 18th centuries. Cazzati's Varij e diversi capricci per camera e per chiesa (1669) includes such dances as corrente, brando, giga, balletto and capriccio. Ludovico Roncalli's Capricci armonici sopra la chitarra spagnola (1692) contains nine dance suites. Allemanda, Corrente, Gigua (sic), Sarabanda, Minuet and Gavotta are included, but no individual movements are labelled ‘capriccio’. G.B. Brevi's Bizzarie armoniche, overo Sonate da camera (1693) contains six dance suites (ordine), and capriccios are included among the dances. J.S. Bach closed his Partita bwv826 with a capriccio. Bach's Capriccio bwv992 ‘On the Departure of his Most Beloved Brother’ is perhaps the best-known example of the use of the term in the 18th century for a keyboard work in one or more movements. The term was often applied in violin music, from the time of Biagio Marini (1626) and Farina (1627), and G.B. Vitali used it (1669) for a quartet sonata; later it apparently came to signify music of a virtuoso character.
By the early 18th century, a true cadenza in a concerto or solo sonata is often called ‘capriccio’ to suggest its improvised and fanciful character and to emphasize that it exceeds the boundaries of the ornamented cadence. Such capriccios were frequently written out in full by composers. P.A. Locatelli applied the term to the virtuoso passages for solo violin that conclude the outer movements of each of the 12 concertos of his L'arte del violino op.3 (1733); these capriccios, often as long as the rest of the movement, are really technical or virtuoso studies. Tartini (1740) and F.M. Veracini (1744) used the term in a similar sense. Other passages of this nature are found in Vivaldi's concertos, in Bach's transcription for organ (bwv594) of Vivaldi’s op.7 no.11 (in the extended virtuoso solo section at the end of the last movement), and in the cadenza in the first movement of Bach's Brandenburg Concerto no.5, which can be considered a capriccio. Paganini's 24 capriccios op.1 (c1810) continue in Locatelli's tradition. These études for solo violin (in particular no.24 in A minor) provided later composers with material for countless variations, rhapsodies and transcriptions, as well as the inspiration for technical studies for other instruments.
During the 19th century the title came to be applied freely and in a variety of senses. In 1834 Schumann defined the capriccio as ‘a genre of music which is different from the “low-comedy” burlesque in that it blends the sentimental with the witty. Often there is something étude-like about it’. Some composers, including Mendelssohn and Brahms, used it for short piano pieces, humorous or fanciful in character. There are orchestral capriccios by many 19th- and 20th-century composers, including Tchaikovsky and Walton. Stravinsky’s piano concerto Capriccio (1929) takes its title from the third movement: ‘Allegro capriccioso ma tempo giusto’, which was the first to be composed. Stravinsky is said to have had Praetorius's definition in mind when he wrote the work. Penderecki wrote capriccios for solo cello and for small chamber ensembles. Strauss's opera Capriccio (1942) takes its name from the caprice-like nature of its libretto.
ApelG
BoydenH
MGG2 (H. Engel/S. Schaal) [incl. list of capriccios]
PraetoriusSM, iii
SartoriB
VogelB
M. Praetorius: Syntagma musicum, iii (Wolfenbüttel, 1618, 2/1619/R)
A. Furetière: Dictionnaire universel (The Hague, 1690/R)
A. Somer: The Keyboard Music of J.J. Froberger (diss., U. of Michigan, 1963)
I. Horsley: Fugue: History and Practice (New York, 1966)
R. Green: ‘Robert Schumann als Lexikograph’, Mf, xxxii (1979), 394–403
G. Strahle: ‘Fantasy and Music in Sixteenth- and Seventeenth-Century England’, Chelys, xvii (1988), 28–32
ERICH SCHWANDT