In Italy’s region of Tuscany Lucca and its province provides scarcely less fertile land for novel-writing than Florence and its own tradition of fiction with such titles as George Eliot’s ‘Romola’ and E. M. Forster’s ‘A Room with a View’.  Authors like David Plante (‘Annunciation’), Elizabeth George (‘Just One Evil Act’), Tatiana de Rosnay (‘Sarah’s Key’), Michael Dibdin (‘And then you Die’) and Margaret Moore (‘The Tuscan Termination’ series of novels) have all been inspired by the equally seductive atmosphere of this beautiful part of the peninsula. Note, among them, however, the preponderance of ‘gialli’ – the Italian term given to crime novels!

The Lucchesia’s literary background has already been well served by the ‘A Year in Bla-Bla Land’ type of book which combines travel encounters with the dual delights and hardships of restoring a derelict ‘casa colonica’ and it lacks nothing in historical accounts; a genre which includes such classics as Iris Origo’s ‘The Merchant of Prato’ and Eric Scigliano’s ‘Michelangelo’s Mountain: The Quest For Perfection in the Marble Quarries of Carrara’.

It is a rare thing, however, when a novel is published which combines themes ranging from historical accounts to personal experiences to descriptions of local places, traditions and events.

Anna Valencia’s ‘The Chestnut House’ is this very special kind of novel. It may be read principally as a work which interlaces the stories of various characters who are related to a specific area of Lucca province, the ‘Garfagnana’, that semi ‘wild-west’ part of Tuscany which, with its marble mountains, all-encompassing forests haunted by wolf-packs and isolated villages only quite recently connected by tarmac to the outside world, makes such a startling contrast to the touristic view of Tuscany as a land of rolling hills, vineyards, olive groves and rows of cypresses where one sips endless supplies of Chianti.

I quote from the publisher’s blurb regarding the novel and its author:

‘The Chestnut House’ deals with two women, separated by two generations and continents, both trapped in their grief and unable to move forwards. Upon inheriting Stazzana, a crumbling farmhouse in the wilderness of northern Tuscany, Emma flies out to Italy in the hopes that unravelling the truth of the past will heal her present. 

Local retired farmer Luciano befriends them and finds a new lease of life introducing them to the traditions and wildlife of the mountains, but he has his own secret to harbour, his own need for redemption. His sister, Giuliana, left Italy in 1945, and has spent her life running from the past, the past that Emma now seeks. Can the truth of what happened at Stazzana set them both free?

Despite graduating in Philosophy and French, it is Italian that truly speaks to Anna Valencia. Her passion has seen the writer live in Rome, Milan, and Tuscany. She currently resides with her husband and three children on the family farm in the Dartmoor National Park, Devon, England. Between teaching English to Italian students, she is currently writing her second novel. Her debut, The Chestnut House, is directly inspired by Anna’s farm in the Tuscan village of Montaltissimo, and the local history generously shared by her neighbours there.’

The novel’s narrative structure spreads itself out in chapters, each dedicated to one of its leading characters where they reveal their life experiences and memories regarding the mysteries of the Garfagnana. In this respect, before coming to live and work in Italy I had never known what it was like to reside in a former war zone and much of the storyline deals with the bloody civil war the ‘bel paese’ had to endure when local partisans fought against a puppet fascist government under German occupying forces. ‘The Chestnut House’ is particularly well-researched and the author has left a list of books consulted on this period of history at the end of the novel in addition to acknowledging the invaluable help she received from Molazzana’s ‘Museo della Linea Gotica’ which deals with the resistance.

One of the most endearing features of ‘The Chestnut House’ is that the Italian place-names in the book have not been fictionalised. These places do exist with the same names: there are villages called Sassi and Elio and the Pania Mountain, the queen of the Apuan range, still reigns supreme. Indeed, as there are ‘Sound of Music’ tours encouraged by the homonymous film in the gorgeous country round Salzburg, I feel that there very well could be similar tours motivated by this beautifully inspired novel which has been written with the most subtle honesty and disarming sincerity.

In these days reading ‘The Chestnut House’ seems to me to be particularly relevant. Not only are we experiencing hard times as a result of a most devastating pandemic but our age has sadly shown us that war in Europe is not just something from a heart-breaking past; we only have to switch on our television sets to witness the most atrocious sights involving everyone from the oldest to the youngest in a scenario which in Europe, we mistakenly thought, would never have to see again.

I especially recommend ‘The Chestnut House’ to all readers who love Italy, Lucca province and, in particular, the Garfagnana, whether, they are interested in the history of the area, whether they want to discover its traditions and cuisine, or whether they just want to read an engrossing and very moving story involving love and death, misplacement and self-realization, hindrance and encouragement.

For details on how you can order your copy see:

https://www.bookguild.co.uk/bookshop/book/291/The%20Chestnut%20House/

Or you can also obtain ‘The Chestnut House’ on-line on ‘Kindle’.

Below is a selection of photographs I have taken over the years while exploring the ‘Gothic Line’, that defensive wall dividing the Allied from the Axis forces during the last war.

PS We got to know the author as she and her husband were the original foster parents of our cat Archie (seen here on my wife Sandra’s recent birthday):

In this dark time, where the crepuscular pre-dawn light of our mountain valley seems to echo in agreement with the tragic events now unfolding with ever greater calamitous destruction and loss of life in my continent, I felt more strongly than ever that my country of upbringing should have continued to be part of the European Union. That Brexit ever happened is yet another heart-breaking permutation of that word ‘tragic’.

On this subject I have received the following from a friend whose opinions I deeply respect and whose analysis I believe is worth quoting here in full.

Here is what Jim Roberts has to say about the current situation:

***

“Brexit and the Russian Invasion of Ukraine.

In this posting I ask people to think strategically and to say that these two issues are not separate ones.

1. The invasion of Ukraine was a premeditated action by Putin one which he has been planning for a very long time, at least since the illegal occupation of the Crimea by Russia in 2014 and perhaps longer still.

2. The EU Referendum in 2016 and Brexit has given Russia/Putin a huge opportunity which to weaken NATO and the EU. It is a fact that Russia and Putin interfered in the Referendum to get the result he desired. The public report concerning this interference must now be made fully public and be widely circulated.

3. Both NATO and the EU are powerful European institutions. They are not independent of each other. NATO is the military wing of this united power and the EU is the economic wing. They are two sides of the same coin, for without having a united cause you cannot confront Putin’s Russia. The economic side is required to devise and enforce sanctions against Russia. and the Military alliance is required to enforce a strong defence against nations with other philosophies. Russia has gravely weakened the European alliance and the cause of Western Democracy by Brexit: that is why it/he funded it!!!!

4. Russia has torn up the Minsk Agreements! https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Minsk_agreements. These agreements are central to the understanding what Putin’s Russia has done.

5. Brexit must be abandoned ASAP. Since the Referendum was held a new world-wide geo-political urgency has occurred to do so!!! The NATO and the EU must formally be declared one united force and international arrangement. This union must include the North American Free Trade Area (NAFTA) and the Trans-Pacific Partnership (CPTPP). UK cannot be or remain outside the European arrangement. UK is too important for European unity in the face of this aggressive invasion by Russia. Brexit is contrary to this kind of strategic thinking and must be abandoned and reversed ASAP!

6. NATO needs to begin to move naval forces into the Black Sea to isolate and neutralise the Crimea. The same applies to the Arctic Sea in the north.

7. The World Trade Organisation must exclude Russia and rethink its purpose, aim and goals in the light of the new geo-political situation!!”

***

Thankyou Jim. I am in complete agreement with what you say and, like you and so many in this shady world, my heart is bleeding at what is happening although I continue to believe in the redemptive powers of hope and a clearer light of understanding.

Below is a selection of photographs we took during our visit to wonderful Ukraine in 2004 when the Crimea had not been annexed by Russia.

First, Sebastopol and the setting for the Crimean war in which Florence Nightingale founded the modern nursing service.

Second, Livadia palace where the Yalta Conference, which decided the future fate of Europe, was held in February, 1945;

And third, the colossal war memorial in the capital city of Kyiv:

Солідарність з народом України! Нехай їхня боротьба закінчиться перемогою для своєї країни і нехай відновиться благословенний мир у вільній і повністю незалежній Україні!

Florence in February? Why not! It’s a good time to visit this exquisite city after Christmas but before Easter for there won’t be too many tourists and museum queues around. The climate, too, will be quite equable for Florence is notorious for having the most extreme temperatures of any Italian city. In winter temperatures can plummet to well below freezing and in summer the place turns into an insupportable sauna. It’s all to do with the city’s geographic location at the point where the Arno valley closes in and traps air.

We enjoyed our recent stay in the City of the Lily very much. Here are a few photos from our time there.

Florence is a very safe city as far as Covid-19 regulations are involved. Since January Italy has made a distinction between the ‘Green’ and the ‘Super Green’ pass. The ‘Super Green’ is issued if one has had a minimum of three vaccinations including the booster; it is the only way to gain admission into museums and other public institutions like stadiums and night clubs. The common ‘Green Pass’ is not valid here and is only useful in gaining entry into bars and restaurants.

These regulations – strict government decrees with imposing fines if transgressed – are to continue to the end of March at the very least. This is all very different from laisse-faire Brexitania where anti-covid vaccinations are merely ‘suggested’ or ‘recommended’. Having had my Super Green Pass issued to me as a result of vaccinations taken in Italy I wonder how visitors from the UK will fare in Italy’s harsh regime. One thing is sure, however: having no Super Green pass or its equivalent means no way of enjoying the rich artistic treasured of Florence’s galleries although admission to the wonderful frescoes many of its churches contain is sometimes  a little less strict and does not always depend on the ‘super’ green ‘.

Behind the former archbishop’s palace which stands in front of Santa Maria del Fiore, Florence’s cathedral, I came across this plaque:

It reads in translation as follows: “The ‘Black Eagle’ hotel stood here. The fourteen year old Mozart stayed here in the spring of 1770 during the first of his three journeys to Italy and showed his musical genius to the city of Florence.” Placed here on April 30th 2006 by etc.”

Anything to do with this celestial musician animates me whether it is in Salzburg, London, Paris, Prague or any of the other Europeans cities Mozart stayed at during his hopeful but sadly unsuccessful journeys to get a decent job as composer-in-residence.

On 2 April 1770 the fourteen-year-old Wolfgang Amadeus Mozart (1756-1791) performed in a concert in Florence at the villa of Poggio Imperiale (now a prestigious girl’s academy) in the presence of the grand-ducal court.  Mozart had arrived in Florence on March 30, 1770 and left on April 9.  On his first trip to Italy Wolfgang was accompanied by his father Leopold (1719-1787), who too was a composer and also a writer of a manual on violin playing.  Leopold had brought the young Amadeus to Italy mainly to study that country’s musical heritage although he also wished to find important professional appointments for his son, particularly in Florence, at the court of the Grand Duke Pietro Leopoldo.  In fact, Pietro Leopoldo had already heard the young Amadeus perform on two occasions, in 1762 and in 1769, and enthused about him.  The Mozarts, leaving from Bologna, arrived in Florence on the evening of March 30, 1770, entered the city from the Porta di San Gallo, in today’s Piazza Libertà, walked along Via Larga, today’s Via Cavour, and Via Martelli, and, reaching Piazza di San Giovanni, took lodging in the most important hotel in the area, the ‘Aquila Nera’ or ‘Black Eagle’.  The ‘Black Eagle’, no longer extant, was located on the corner between the Via Cerretani and Piazza dell’Olio and this is the place where the commemorative plaque was placed.

The day after their arrival in Florence, Amadeus had to stay in bed because of a cold caught in a rain storm as they crossed the Apennines.  On 1 April father and son were able to go to the court chancellery to obtain an audience with the Grand Duke.  Thanks to a letter of introduction, they were able to meet Duke Pietro Leopoldo the same morning.  He welcomed the Mozarts with great cordiality and was happy to see Amadeus again. So much so that he arranged a concert for the following day at the villa of Poggio Imperiale.

On the evening of 2 April in the ballroom of the Medici villa of Poggio Imperiale, the summer residence of the grand dukes, in the presence of numerous Florentine notables, the young Mozart played the harpsichord accompanied on the violin by the famous Pietro Nardini, first court violinist, performing some sonatas by Luigi Boccherini.  Unfortunately Leopold Mozart’s desire to see his son fill a position at court did not happen. Wolfgang Mozart was however paid 3336 Lire for his performance at the concert.

The Mozarts’ stay in Florence continued for a few more days, during which Amadeus visited the singers Giovanni Manzuoli and Carlo Niccolini. However, the most memorable meeting was when Amadeus met the contemporary English and musical prodigy Thomas Linley (1756-1778), son of the composer Thomas Linley.  The two immediately became close friends so much that they performed on April 5 a violin duet in the Aquila Nera hotel.

The Mozarts left Florence for Rome on the morning of April 9, 1770. The last person to greet them was Thomas Linley who accompanied them all the way outside the city walls.  The two young men would never see each other again, eight years later Thomas died in an accident.  Amadeus Mozart would never see Florence again, although Leopold Mozart in a letter to his wife in the spring of 1770 described Florence as follows: “I wish you could see Florence, its surroundings, its position: you would say that here you have to live and die. The Mozarts did return to Italy twice more, but on both occasions they did not visit Florence.  Yet, in their last Italian journey, between the winter of 1772 and the spring of 1773, Leopold still waited for an invitation from the Grand Duke for a position at court for his son, but Pietro Leopoldo, too busy giving Tuscany political stability and economic development, once again did not take the opportunity to have Mozart’s musical genius recognized with a court appointment.

Here is something more about the Linleys and the Mozarts. Thomas Linley Senior had twelve children, seven of whom were the really musically talented ones and one of whom, Thomas Linley junior, was the Mozart-equivalent England might have had. Here unfolds a story full of joy and tragedy in equal measure. The three beautiful daughters, true English roses, exquisite singers and eloquent actresses, Elizabeth, Maria and Mary (odd to have both versions of the name in an English family) all died in their twenties or early thirties of TB.

Worse of all, however, was Thomas junior’s fate. The boy was an exact contemporary of Mozart when he came to Lucca and Florence to study with the great violinist Nardini, who imparted a ‘Galante’ grace to the compositional style “Tomasino” (as he was called in Italy) learnt from his Handelian teacher William Boyce. Sadly Thomas was caught in a storm while boating at his friend, the Duke of Ancaster’s castle at Grimsthorpe, and drowned, aged 22, when the boat overturned in spite of every effort to swim to shore.

The meeting between Linley and Mozart in Florence in 1768 is legendary. The two child prodigies got on like a house on fire playing both games and music together, with Mozart accompanying Linley’s violin on the piano, and cried buckets when they learnt that each would have to go their own way the next day. How wonderful and touching it would be to have been there and witnessed that exceptional evening! Charles Burney did, however, in retrospect and recounted it in his vivid volume of the state of music on the continent.

Thomas Linley senior died of a broken heart in 1795 having seen all his most promising and talented children die before his very eyes. Mrs Linley, however, lived to a ripe old age of 90, in 1820.

When interviewed shortly before his death, Wolfgang Mozart declared that “had he lived Thomas would have been by far that country’s greatest composer, equalling even myself.”

The gorgeous Linley family portraits by Thomas Gainsborough were bequeathed to the art gallery designed by Sir John Soane, belonging to my old school, Dulwich College and I always love to see them when I visit this gem of a place in South London. 

“What would have happened to English music if Thomas Linley junior had not been victim of a tempest?” I wondered. Linley was at the heights of his powers when he died. The “Song of Moses” (ironically dealing with the drowning of the Egyptian hordes in pursuit of the Israelites across the Red Sea) is full proof of that. It’s just another of life’s eternal mysteries.

I have recordings of the best of Thomas Linley’s extant music on the Hyperion label, surely one of the most wonderful rediscoveries of a composer who was said to show more child prodigy talent that even Purcell or Mozart.

There is so much more to the story that I have had leave out and so many mysteries concerning the “nest of nightingales” as the Linley family was called.

I remain, however, grateful that a plaque in one of Florence’s back streets is there to recall some of the most magic moments in the history of music and to make us yearn for what might have been in the world of music if both Mozart and Linley had been able to live longer.

What’s the worst thing about moving one’s possessions from a former home to a new house? It’s losing things! I’m not referring to that Picasso I can’t seem to find or that little piece of rococo Meissen. Rather, it’s the seemingly insignificant items that matter most. Since we started our move (it’s finished now but not quite. I still have to transfer the garden hose extension, for instance) I have been unable to locate my Swiss Army knife and my box of coloured crayons. Things were even worst until a couple of days ago when Sandra managed to find the four panes of glass to fit into our garden lantern.  There they were, purposefully placed against a cellar wall. But then glass is generally transparent so how could one immediately spot them?

One loses things all the time. Or at least we do. Actually in most cases it’s luckily not actually losing but misplacing them.  For instance, to our shock horror, yesterday evening just as we were starting another tournament of Chinese Checkers I found one of my pegs (I always like to play using the colour blue) missing!

Even worst is that for a couple of days now I have lost my medical prescription papers for my blood test, dutifully typed out by my Doctor’s secretary. Where did I leave them? I thought in the car but then I may have moved them to a safer place. And that’s where the trouble starts. Moving stuff to what one believes is a safer and easier place to find things. An example of this is the locality of the spare key to my garden shed. I know where I’d put it but the key wasn’t there anymore! Then I remembered that I’d changed its place to another location since I felt that undesirables now knew where the spare key was kept. But I couldn’t remember the new place. And so the enervating saga goes on…and on. Worst of all is the situation with computer passwords which get changed and then NOT written down. But then we are really entering disastrously hopeless territory enough to tear out what hair one’s got left.

Let me try to put things into perspective. Most things (apart from that Picasso) can be replaced. Even lost Chinese chequer marbles! What is more important is not to lose one’s own marbles, one’s life or, more importantly the life of one’s beloved. Today, for instance, is Saint Valentine’s day and I celebrate the fact that both I and my supreme love are still alive and, moreover, in reasonable health, surrounded by a lovely environment, nice cats and enough vitals to feed on and drink to celebrate.

Those should be the only things it would be essential not to lose and so, in keeping, with previous Saint Valentine’s days we have passed together I write another paean to   ‘la mia bella’.

Saint Valentine’s Day 2022

You are my sempiternal Valentine:

lucid snowdrop in winter’s darkest night,

the mother goddess’s corybantine,

ethereal light that ever shines bright.

You fill our mountain house with sweetest love;

soft sylvan slopes breathe coming spring’s flowers,

the chestnut glades fit you like a glove

and promise the happiest of happy hours.

I am so lucky to have and hold you –

your warmth, your softest cheeks your lucent eyes –

in my arms for every moment that’s true

and banish for ever all saddest sighs!

Yes, we were right. It wasn’t just our imagination or any excess glass of vino. It was, in fact, an earthquake that hit us that recent night.

Later we read in the papers that “a strong earthquake was felt by the population in Tuscany, in the areas of Lucca, Pistoia, Viareggio and Pisa at 2.36 am on 6 February 2022. The shock, as shown by the data published on the Ingv (National Institute of Geophysics and Volcanology), had a magnitude of 3.8 on the Richter scale. The earthquake had its epicentre in the Viareggio area and occurred at a depth of 8 km. The earthquake was felt by worried citizens who wrote dozens of messages on social networks.. Those who slept were awakened with a start by the earthquake. At the moment there doesn’t seem to be any damage to people or things.”

So there we are! Having been brought up in the island kingdom of the UK (although they too are not unknown) I am more used to shocks brought on by strong winds or flooding. In Italy which, in contrast to the ancient largely Cambrian and Ordovician rocks of Britain, is made up of a much more recent geological past with extensive Triassic era mountan folding, earthquakes are a rather more common feature of everyday life. Buildings have ordnances regarding their structural suitability for resisting seismic shocks and earthquake drills are as common in schools and public institutions as fire drills are in UK ones.

Just over one hundred years ago our area’s worst earthquake to-date occured. The Val di Serchio, Garfagnana and Lunigiana earthquake, with its epicentre at Villa Collemandina, was a disastrous seismic event that occurred on 7 September 1920 and struck the region of Tuscany between the provinces of Lucca and Massa Carrara, causing 171 deaths and 650 injuries. It was one of the most destructive seismic events recorded in the Apennine region in the twentieth century and was the strongest ever recorded in Tuscany in historical times, as well as the one with the highest number of victims of the twentieth century, surpassing that which occurred the previous year in Mugello.

If there was a positive side to this event it was that, thanks to good news coverage, the availability of official damage documents and the abundance of recordings from surveillance stations across Europe, it has been regarded as a first-rate case study for improving knowledge of tectonics and ‘macroseismic analysis. Let us hope, however, that just because another seismic disaster is supposed to strike our part of the world one hundred years later we are not ‘due for one’ like the inhabitants of San Francisco.

Now judge for yourselves whether the following photo of our trusty 4 X 4 Panda yesterday shows the result of a seismic shock or a slightly misjudged driving manouvre.

Whatever it was, the same word, ‘shock’, can be used to describe it. Luckily, stalwart local help intervened shortly afterwards and soon our brave little car was happily wending its homeward-bound path.

Yesterday afternoon, in the continuing miraculously clear and noonday-warm winter weather we have been experiencing for some weeks now, Sandra led me on an exploratory walk through abandoned and forgotten structures on our land. These included hencoops and rabbit-hutches which, although held up by a seemingly solid wall, were perilously close to a thousand foot chasm which, from aerial heights, overlooked the once splendiferous Villa Fiori, now also sadly abandoned.

Perhaps I might use one of these cliff-top chambers to spend some meditative days pondering on the vanity of the world?

Later we came across this particularly magnificent and savage feline disporting himself among equally wild daffs:

In the evening further bizarre sights welcomed me.

Were these the traces of magic mushroom rings or the effects of alien flying saucers landing in our garden? No, not so far. The radiating illuminations were merely the special effects of our recently purchased and very cheapo solar garden lights which will signal a way to our garden bench even on the darkest of nights. Maybe then we will come across hallucinogenic fungi or immigrants from the Planet Thaarg X34B6…

I sometimes think the best time to explore our fabulous Apennine forests is not so much in the springtime but in supposedly desolate January. The explosion of foliage has yet to come, the heat is still a vague memory and the almost bare undergrowth enables one to walk around at will without being immersed in ferns or tangled and scratched by brambles. The bare trees (excepting those evergreen emperors of the forests, the conifers) allow virtually unobstructed views over adjoining valleys and distant mountain ranges Vistas arise unexpectedly; unseen villages and farmsteads spread out before like a living Google Earth screenshot.

Yesterday was a characteristic winter’s day in point. We took a lovely ramble on Monte della Serra which faces our house. It was the greatest pleasure to enjoy the winter woods bathed in warm sunshine from the bluest of skies. The trees and the wild life were our only companions. The views were magnificently expansive and the crunch of dead leaves under our feet had dainty signs of life sprouting from them in the form of purple and white crocuses. Truly winter is also a wonderfully comforting season in our exquisite part of the world.

It’s now almost two years since the world has been under the oppressive cloud of the covid pandemic. From its origin in China in December 2019 the virus spread worldwide with Italy’s first case in Rome on 31^st January 2020.  That country was particularly hard hit by the virus with the highest number of victims in Europe by Easter 2021. The images of rows of army trucks carrying out covid dead from hospitals in Bergamo, for example, remain harrowing. Italy’s situation today is somewhat improved; it ranks eighth in covid deaths world statistics with its 149,097 victims surpassed by the UK’s 158,363 deaths.

In Italy talking about one’s state of health with others is an all pervading conversational topic and appearing to take the place of the UK’s preoccupation with the weather. The question ‘how are you?’ will not merely elicit the typically brief Anglo-Saxon riposte of ‘not too bad’ but may involve one listening for some time to details of liver complaints, recent operations, allergies and so forth. It is, therefore, no surprise that Italy, shocked by the dreadful initial impact it received from the virus, sprang promptly into action and with its amazing national health system initiated a thorough first lock down. On 11 March 2020, Prime Minister Conte prohibited all commercial activity except for supermarkets and pharmacies and shortly afterwards, the Italian government closed all non-essential businesses and industries, and restricted movement of people.  

I was lucky that I had undergone an essential operation in Italy before the pandemic spread throughout the peninsula. However, I then found myself in the UK, unable to reach Italy before the summer of that year because of the travel restrictions.  

Medical science came to rescue with the development of covid vaccines and by the summer of 2021 I had received two doses of the Pfizer jab at Viareggio’s vaccination centre and became the proud possessor of a green passport which enabled me to use public transport, attend public events like concerts, shows and museums and get a cup of cappuccino at the bar without having to sit outside.

I managed to reach the UK in August 2021 where I found the situation regarding Covid 19 considerably laid back when compared with the draconian laws of the country I had flown from. For example, not everyone in London was wearing masks and there was no green passport system in operation. I was particularly shocked at the way passengers were crowding into the lifts at Bayswater tube station (which has no escalators) without any social distancing.

Upon my return to Italy, this time happily accompanied by my wife from whom I had been separated for almost a year, I found a country with fewer restrictions on travel and attending public events but with the strictest rules regarding the green pass which was mandatory for entry into most public places and events.

This January I received notification that my two jabs would soon require a booster. I visited the Tuscan vaccination site at https://prenotavaccino.sanita.toscana.it/#/home and booked an appointment at my nearest location which was the civil protection centre at Castelnuovo di Garfagnana. I could have gone sooner to Lucca San Luca hospital if I wanted but preferred to travel more locally making it also into a shopping and sightseeing excursion.

The Civil Protection centre is a modern, rather bare concrete cube placed near the town’s fire station in an area which has only recently started development. I was impressed both by the courtesy and the professionalism of the staff involved in the vaccination procedure there several of whom were volunteers.

After filling in a form I was seen by a doctor who asked me about any medical conditions I had suffered from. Then it was the turn of the jab followed by ten minutes in the lounge to ensure that no contrary effects arose.

I was told that I might experience headaches later but nothing like that happened to me. The rest of the day was spent swanning around shopping, in which I bought some new trekking shoes, and a return to our lovely little home (and cats) which was basking in the most glorious winter sunshine.

We are informed anti-covid regulations will be reviewed again on February 11th. Already this month the wearing of masks in urban locations will no longer be mandatory. Who knows how long restrictions will still apply?  One thing is certain, however; we have been lucky but it will be rather difficult to forget these vexing two years of pandemic scare, mask-wearing, social distancing, green passes and, sadly for several of us, friends and acquaintances lost to the ravages of the ghastly virus.

(Crocuses in our chestnut wood – Presages of Spring!)

Happily one’s musical tastes are ever evolving …or at least mine are. New discoveries are made regularly and old ones are being constantly re-evaluated. At the present time, in the midst of an Apennine winter which is throwing up a succession of days ranging from brilliantly blue freezing to lukewarm grey  overcast I have rediscovered Tchaikovsky and in particular his first three symphonies.

How many symphonies did this composer, described by his fellow musicians as the most Russian of them, write? There are six numbered symphonies although wags like to say that Pyotr wrote just three since the preponderance of performances are of numbers 4, 5 and 6. However, if one adds the unnumbered ‘Manfred’ symphony and the restored symphony in Eb (which was supposed to be the original no 6) then the composer’s symphonic inventory expands to eight.

My original objections to this truly great composer were based on early childhood trips to the ‘Nutcracker’ ballet at London’s Royal Festival Hall which I regrettably found a bit boring.  Later that greatest of pianistic showmen, Liberace, stole the show (and the pleasure) for me with his rendition of that extraordinary opening of the first piano concerto. Emotional splurging became my description of this sort of music. Later the mistranslated sixth ‘Pathetique’, symphony (the correct translation from the Russian should be ‘passionate’) became unfortunately associated for me with a couple who, in student days occupied an adjoining accommodation. They would put on this searing work when indulging in their nocturnal sports under the sheets. Sheet (or winding sheet) indeed, for this work has been termed the longest musical suicide note as a few days after its first performance in 1893 the composer died after drinking a glass of water infected with cholera (whether accidentally or on purpose is still being debated today).   

A school friend, who later became well-known for his controversial monograph of another Russian composer, Shostakovich, (and also his exhaustive account of the Beatles song repertoire) bemoaned to me the fact that Tchaikovsky was just known for a handful of popular party pieces like the ‘1812’ and the Sugar-Plum fairy while his really great works were neglected.

The transport of my thousand-plus vinyl collection to a cantina of our new home, a collection which was very nearly disposed of, not only by the damp which made so many record covers look as if they had been devoured by mice, but also by the feeling that it was superfluous to requirements, has enabled me to play several Tchaikovsky recordings which I bought up during those years when local libraries were disposing of vinyl in favour of digital CDs, ignorant of the fact that vinyl would make a dramatic comeback thirty years later, and has prompted me in my reawakening of interest in Tchaikovsky.

In particular, the ‘un-played’ symphonies numbers 1-3 have utterly stunned me with their transcendent orchestration, their splendid melodies and (strangely for a composer whose life appeared to gravitate from one emotional crisis to another) their encouraging optimism.

True, symphony no 1, subtitled ‘Winter Day dreams’, caused the composer much angst but little of this shows through a truly delightful product, so appropriate for this time of year when the seemingly dead earth is really burgeoning with hidden creation. The title of the second symphony, ‘Little Russian’ or ‘Ukrainian’, reminded me of the present tense political climate regarding the country I visited earlier this century.  The finale, based on a folksong called ‘the Crane’ (the bird, not the building accessory…) is absolutely spectacular and so colourfully vibrant in its reiterations.

I have the Simon recording, the first one based on the original 1872 version which is so much more effective that its 1880 revision. The ‘Mighty Handful’, the nickname given to the group of five Russian composers fundamental for the renaissance of Russian music (that included Borodin and Rimsky Korsakov), thought so too and the movement has ever been especially popular with Russian audiences.

However, it’s Tchaikovsky’s symphony no 3 (with its subtitle ‘Polish’ given to it in view of its polonaise-like rhythms) that has completely captured me. Starting off with a somewhat lugubrious introduction it unfolds into the first movement’s life-affirming splendour. This is followed a delightful dance movement succeeded by an elegiac piece. Then comes the scherzo, absolutely enchanting in its quite ravishing orchestration. The finale would be sufficient to put any pessimistic thoughts to bed – it is truly life-enhancing at its most superbly fiery.  

Thank goodness we have music like this to stand ourselves back on our feet again, especially during these dismally confusing times: we thoroughly need it!