Quino, "Potentes, prepotentes, impotentes", Buenos Aires, 1989

Quino, "Potentes, prepotentes, impotentes", Buenos Aires, 1989

May 22, 2011

DR. ADOLFO GIULIANI AND M° LUIGI DE FILIPPI ON LAW AND MUSIC

Dear all,
we are going to conclude our Law and the Humanities course with a great event: 3 lectures about Law and Music with the participation of a professional violinist, M° Luigi De Filippi, on the 27th of May. The last lecture is thus open to everyone: please inform all the people you think could be interested!

ABSTRACT:
Law and Music: Harmony, Time and History
Dr Adolfo Giuliani — with the participation of Maestro Luigi De Filippi (Seminar 3)

What does music have to do with law? At first glance, very little. But as we take a particular perspective the two might open a fruitful field of investigation. To this end this seminar offers an exercise in comparison. Examined carefully law and music appear as two intellectual traditions with features which link them in a number of ways, and most importantly, present them as communicable and comparable. These features are harmony, time and history. Examined from this perspective, music might offer ways of answering some central questions raised within the legal tradition.


Seminar 1— Harmony (25 May)



A first feature of the western legal tradition is the internal coherence of its constructions, namely, the idea of a legal system. As it is well-known, some early examples are to be found in sixteenth century France, in the works of Duaren, Doneau, Bodin, and other authors later known as the Systematiker. This seminar shows that the idea of a system was borrowed from the vocabulary of music. It reached law through the standard teaching on liberal arts, which included commentaries on Boethius’ and Pythagoras’ music theory. But a complete understanding of this essential feature of western law requires an understanding of the musical chord and of its powerful symbolism.




Seminar 2 — Time (26 May)


It is an obvious observation that legal phenomena are deeply embedded in a dimension of

time. Precepts emerge, unfold and decay, subverted by new precepts, against the complicating dimension of time. But how time is perceived and conceptualised is greatly dependent on changes in the intellectual context. This seminar focuses on the great codifications between the eighteenth- and nineteenth-centuries, and shows that this phase must be placed in the context of a sharp and creative break with the past, a context marked by a radical change in time consciousness.
This phenomenon profoundly affected music, determining an upheaval in the perception and conceptualisation of time and rhythm.



Seminar 3 — History, with the participation of M° Luigi De Filippi (27 May)

Another important feature of a tradition is how it perceives its own past — its ‘pastness’. This seminar examines the rise of history-consciousness in nineteenth-century Germany, pausing on the project furthered in law by F. v. Savigny, and in music by A.F.J. Thibaut (who, interestingly, was also a jurist). This sense of ‘pastness’ profoundly affected both law and music, leading to the contemplation of pure and timeless structures of thought.
A profound concern with the ‘pastness’ affects today’s musical interpretation. In this seminar M° Luigi De Filippi, a highly respected violin virtuoso and an expert of historical performance, will illustrate some of the challenges today facing a historically-minded performance.


Adolfo Giuliani’s CV:

Dr Adolfo Giuliani (MSc London School of Economics, MPhil Cambridge, PhD Cambridge) is a legal historian working on sixteenth- and seventeenth-century civil law. He has published essays on aspects of private law, interpretation and proof, and is currently working on a book on late ius commune presumptions and on a legal history manual for Hart, Oxford. Before pursuing an academic career Dr Giuliani was a professional musician. Following formal studies at the Conservatoire he won a British Council scholarship to study violin with Emanuel Hurwitz (Royal Academy of Music, London) and Analysis of Music at the King's College, London. Further studies followed with Norbert Brainin (Amadeus Quartet). He has performed in opera, symphonic and chamber orchestras and ensembles. Interested in sparking a debate on violin teaching and interpretation, for a number of years he published a scholarly journal under the aegis of Lord Yehudi Menuhin and M° Piero Farulli (Scuola di Musica di Fiesole).

Luigi De Filippi’s CV:

A violinist and conductor, Luigi De Filippi studied violin, piano and composition in Rome, showing an early interest in jazz and contemporary music. He subsequently appeared as concertmaster in such orchestras as the Rome Opera House, La Fenice Theatre in Venice, the London Mozart Players , the Flanders Orchestra in Antwerp. In London he made his debut as conductor with the London Mozart Players , and he appeared as soloist – conductor at the Queen Elizabeth Hall, the Royal Festival Hall and the Barbican Centre in London, the Concertgebouw in Amsterdam, the Palau de la Musica in Barcelona.
In 2007 he soloed in the Auckland Festival (New Zealand). He has conducted Antonio Salieri’s opera “Prima la musica, poi le parole” at the Minoritenkirche in Vienna, the very church for which Salieri wrote all his sacred music.

De Filippi has taken part in the first ever recording of music of the philosopher Friedrich Nietzsche, for the label Edipan; he has revived “The Cady”, a 1778 opera by Thomas Linley, a friend of Mozart, conducting the London Mozart Players ; conducting his own group, the Da Ponte Ensemble on period instruments, he has recorded for the label Bongiovanni a baroque opera of 1629, Giacinto Cornachioli’s La Diana Schernita . For the Italian label Warner – Fonit he has recorded a selection of orchestral music of Francesco Saverio Mercadante, conducting the Philharmonia Mediterranea . Luigi has also appeared in television and radio broadcasts, appearing in six programmes on contemporary music for the Italian Television, and in BBC Radio 3 and RAI Radio 3, with live performances and interviews. A CD of Delphin Alard’s Fantasias for violin and chamber orchestra based on some operas of Giuseppe Verdi, recorded with the Orchestra dell’Impresario , has been released in 2008 by the Italian label Gold & Lebet ; a second issue featuring five Donizetti based Fantasias will soon be out.
Luigi has a keen interest in chamber music with period instruments: he is the violinist of the Voces Intimae piano trio (www.vocesintimae.it), now much in demand for concert appearances and recordings. They have made three CDs with the Italian label Symphonia , all on period instruments, with the trios of Franz Schubert and Felix Mendelssohn Bartoldy, and a selection of 19th century Fantasias based on the operas of Vincenzo Bellini.
Intimae’ s double CD of the complete trios of Johann Nepomuk Hummel, issued by Warner Classics, has won much praise all over the world, and has been elected “CD of the year” for 2006 by BBC Radio 3. Voces Intimae has recently made its USA debut, with concerts, master classes and radio recordings and interviews.
philippi@tiscali.it

5 comments:

  1. I enjoyed very much the lesson of today. Until today I never thought that could exist a link between law and music, but now I notice that this two fields share many aspects.
    I played the piano so I know how is different to simply reproduce the notes wrote on a score and really play. When you play an instrument you have to interpreted the notes, you trasmitted something of you, and you are influenced by different aspects (the situation, the context etc). The pianist (as the article mentioneted in class) is like a judge that have to adapt the law to the case on he was called upon. So music is the best methaphor about the law, and they are linked by tradition, both have indelible bases in the past but both need to improve and grow over time by experience.

    Alessandra Olivero

    ReplyDelete
  2. The article I referred to in the class today is not free available. It was published in the "Zeitschrift für Rechtspolitik" in 2003/196. However there is a comment on the statement that a judge is like a pianist in the "Frankfurter Allgemeine Zeitung" which is free available. http://www.faz.net/artikel/C31408/gastbeitrag-richter-ohne-grenzen-30038908.html.
    Regarding to the implementation of European law into national law I want to add a (maybe) fitting metaphor: It seems to me like put a movement today into a symphony from Bach.

    ReplyDelete
  3. I found very interesting the lesson of today. Especially regarding the last topic discussed and remarked by Professor Conte: the evolution from formal classicism to the need to get out of the box defaults to search for new forms of expression and research. This need that we find in music can be translated to the law. I think the highest relationship between music and law is that both are regulated in the same way. That it's because both are disciplines that are full of possible combinations of their parts and they needs to be regulated in a methodical way to give an order to assemble each part of them. I find it a very interesting argument to discuss about, also for the consequences that arise from the need to find new forms of regulation.

    Alessandro Amato

    ReplyDelete
  4. This lesson has been truly enlightening. the music is totally full of rules, laws, without which I think could not seize the practical aspects.
    then following today's lesson I felt that somehow each one listens to music for a verse in the same way, that everyone becomes aware of a false note as there are rules, but not everyone likes the same music even if it is well done and done properly with the same rules.
    I also believe that the evolution of music necessarily lead to the introduction of new rules and new forms of regolamntazione to find a new stimulus and a different music.new
    made with several new rules or even better outside the old rules, but by finding new ways to communicate that
    Monica Di Silvestro

    ReplyDelete
  5. This last lesson was very interesting.
    the connection between music and law is something to think about, for sure music is governed by many rules that must be followed strictly, evolving just as the law and both have a base to work on but look to the future.
    was nice to hear them play the violin, we felt the passion.
    it was the best way to complete the course.

    Francesca Ingrosso

    ReplyDelete