The Villa Bonvisi in the old part of Bagni di Lucca is a grand building, and is also known as the Villa Webb, since it was sold to the rich Scottish banker, one of whose guests was Lord Byron. Other visitors included James III, otherwise known as the ‘Old Pretender’, whose son was Bonnie Prince Charles.

Last Wednesday we too became guests of this noble mansion which has seen so much history. Indeed, more history was made by the solo harpsichord debut of Tommaso Nicoli, barely out of his teens, now perfecting his studies at La Spezia conservatoire and by all accounts, well on the way to becoming one of the most promising of Italy’s new generation of period-music and baroque keyboard players.

Like several historical instances Tommaso comes from a family with a musical background and, like those instances, he has become one of the most talented of them. If his father was a ‘Leopold’ then, clearly he is a ‘Wolfgang’. I was glad to note that Eliseo Sandretti, one of his earlier teachers was there. Eliseo, too, has a musical background, his father having been organist at Valdottavo. Eliseo was performer at the inauguration of the newly-restored Ravani organ at Borgo a Mozzano on which I have written a post at

https://longoio3.com/2018/06/20/borgo-a-mozzanos-magnificent-organ-sings-again/

The expansive hall of Villa Bonvisi was very well-filled. Last year young Nicoli collaborated in a duet concert so this year was truly his solo ‘esordio’ in Bagni di Lucca.

This was the programme:

The preponderance of French baroque music clearly shows the performer’s love of this music. Having been acquainted with Tommaso Nicoli since he was a tear-away kid of seven I was glad that the recordings I made for him of Forqueray, Rameau et al. had clearly remained with him.

Nicoli already has an idiomatic feel for the French 18^th century use of ‘notes inegales’ (i.e. the  performance practice, in which some notes with equal written time values are performed with unequal durations, usually as alternating long and short, or sometimes conversely giving a Scottish ‘snap’.)

Nicoli’s use of ornamentation was also quite prodigious, especially since this is the only way a note can be sustained for any length of time on the plucked instrument.

The Bach prelude and fugue from book one of the well-tempered clavier started, surprisingly for me, with the dampened timbre of lute-stopped strings which then were released in the final fast flourish. (I would, honestly, have preferred to keep the same resonance throughout the whole piece.)

Pacing and timing were very well-though out on the whole, though I am used to some pieces played at a slower tempo.

I was particularly pleased with the Domenico Scarlatti sonata which stands a not unfair comparison with Gilbert Rowland’s rendering. (See my post on that concert at

Heavenly Harpsichord Ripples

I think, however, that repeats should have been included. The cross-handing was pretty good..

I and my guest (who knows a thing or two about music) were rather pleased with the harpsichord’s timbre, (tuned to baroque temperament so you may have to get used to some of the note intervals) which was mellower without the clanginess that some instruments suffer from.

Tommaso Nicoli presented himself very well. He gave a concise and clear introduction of the concert pieces to an audience who was largely not well-acquainted with baroque keyboard music; his Indian muslin white attire was elegant and  well-suited to our muggy summer evenings.

The whole concert was professionally recorded but I took the chance to capture a few snippets myself.

Let my snippets of Tommaso Nicoli’s performance speak for themselves. I think you may be well astounded….

Don’t you agree that the march of the Scythians is definately Tommaso Nicoli’s pièce de resistance?