attr. Fétis/Servais - La Romanesca (For Cello and String Quintet)

The transcription of La Romanesca by the Belgian cellist-composer François Servais (1807-1866) is based primarily on the version by the violinist Pierre Baillot (1771-1842), with the violin part given to the cello and the guitar or string-quintet accompaniment adapted for piano.

Servais’s La Romanesca bears the subtitle fameux Air de Danse de la fin du XVIme Siècle arrangé pour le Violoncelle avec accompagnement de 2 Violons, Alto, Violoncelle et Contrebasse avec sourdines ou Piano tel qu’il a été exécuté par François Servais dans ses Concerts à Vienne. Despite this claim of sixteenth-century origin, the work is more likely a forgery by François-Joseph Fétis (1784-1871), later popularized by Baillot in the 1830s. After its publication by the Viennese firm E. Mollo & A.O. Witzendorf in the summer of 1842, Servais’s transcription was published and reprinted by several other firms.

Stylistically, La Romanesca is not a true sixteenth-century dance, but rather a post-Rameau gavotte. The contrasting section in B major appears to be by Servais himself. Because of the popularity of La Romanesca, Servais’s cello transcription may have helped inspire later cello works such as David Popper’s famous Gavotte in D major and Gaspar Cassadó’s Pastorale, which Cassadó attempted to pass off as a work by François Couperin.

According to Servais scholar Peter François, the first known performance of Servais’s transcription took place in Warsaw on 14 January 1842. Servais performed the work successfully during his 1842 tour in Poland and Austria, including at the debut concert of the Vienna Philharmonic on 28 March 1842.

This set includes the score, solo cello part, and string parts.

ASTA level: 3