Greetings from Genova!

An overview of a weekend in Genova, chasing for Violoncello da Spalla iconography

Daniela Gaidano & A. Visintini

Sep 01, 2023

We spent last weekend in Genova, visiting museums in the day and having aperitif with old friends in the evenings.

We think you might appreciate a few pics of what we saw, in terms of musical iconography.

Palazzo Spinola:

Musei di strada Nuova, Palazzo Bianco e Palazzo Rosso:

Luigi Miradori, 1605/1656, Suonatrice di Liuto - Luciano Bolzone 1590/1645, Gerolamo Gallo, musico della Cappella Ducale di Genova - Alessandro Magnasco 1667/1749, Estasi di San Francesco - Bernardo Strozzi 1581/1644, La Musica

A stand-alone gallery for these two remarkable violoncello piccolo:

Palazzo Bianco, Genova: a music allegory featuring a violoncello piccolo, cealing fresco

Giovanni Battista Carlone, 1603/1684: Angeli Musicanti

In Palazzo Doria-Tursi:

Two clay pots from the 18th century, Liguria, and pics from the Paganini room

In the Cathedral San Lorenzo, the two organ blades show a violoncello on the left and a fairly big violin on the right, close to the lute. we couldn’t date them, they could be anything between 18th and 19th century:

Last but not least, this cello in Palazzo Ducale:

Cealing fresco in the Cappella del Doge, Giovanni Battista Carlone, 1653

Updates from our workshop:

We are still working on moving things to the new place. In the meantime Alessandro’s new Violoncello da Spalla had his last finishing of varnish and got a new bridge. We met Judy Hung, from Montreal, who tried our cellos and we talked about playability, different strings and the use of Violoncello da Spalla at its time. She found our instruments are now easier to play (she tried some of them last year as well): a rewarding feedback for us! Daniela felt inspired to chose the woods for our next two da spalla cellos!