Il Pianto di Maria ("Giunta l'ora fatal") HWV 234

As this new publication goes to press, I cannot refrain from offering readers some considerations on the editorial choices, shared with Maestro Maurizio Machella, that have guided the editing of this wonderful composition in a modern edition.

First of all, I would like to remind you that for some time now the Armelin publishing house has been pursuing the aim of rediscovering or re-proposing a musical repertoire which, unfortunately, has been completely or partially forgotten. This work of ours has led us to highlight both minor composers and works considered marginal, as well as works by famous musicians of which we had partially lost track.

A typical case can be considered the publication of this magnificent cantata "Giunta l'ora fatal", which is listed under number 234 in the works of the great German composer Georg Friedrich Händel. Many doubts have arisen regarding the authenticity of the composition. Recent studies by eminent Italian and German musicologists attribute this work to the Italian composer Giovanni Battista Ferrandini .

Obviously, I do not want to go into considerations that concern musicologists. The publisher's job is to be able to offer the public the best possible music, regardless of the more or less eminent signatures.

The fact that this work was written by Händel, but in a style that is not very Händelian, or that the Venetian Ferrandini was the actual composer, does not detract from the substance of this cantata, which is undoubtedly a masterpiece of the Baroque period.

Obviously, during the publication phase, we asked ourselves and Maestro Machella to which of the two composers this composition should be most clearly attributed for editorial reasons. The choice fell on Händel for the following simple reasons: first of all, in the manuscripts in our possession only the name of the German composer is given; moreover, this work still appears in Händel's catalogue, even though it is accompanied by many doubts as to its authenticity. Another reason is that the attribution to Ferrandini is not certain. Some people have serious doubts, such as Reinhard Goebel who recalls, in the booklet accompanying the CD in which he has admirably recorded the performance of this masterpiece, that Ferrandini was a "composer of a less than mediocre level" and some parts of this composition are of "great rhetorical refinement, hardly conceivable in an 18th-century Italian composer". So while we wait to see this querelle cleared up, we stick to the first, albeit dubious, lesson.

In the end we think that our choice of cover G.F. Händel / incerta / Il pianto di Maria / (Giunta l'ora fatal) / HWV 234 / opera attributed to / Giovanni Battista Ferrandini / is both correct in terms of formal indications of attribution and of appeal to the general public.

I hope that this publication will stimulate musicologists to undertake further studies that will lead to an unequivocal definition of the name of the composer who gave us this wonderful cantata.