“A gift from me personally and at the same time from Italy, which I am honoured to represent, to the entire Maltese people.
A gift that is also a thank you for the historical mission of Malta which, heroically resisting the powerful Ottoman Empire in 1565, marked a fundamental moment in the history of Europe’.
It is with these words that the Italian Ambassador to Malta, Fabrizio Romano, presented his extraordinary initiative of curating in collaboration with the Maltese Ministry of Culture, headed by Owen Bonnici the production of the symphonic poem ‘The Great Siege of Malta in 1565 – Birth of Valletta’, an unpublished work composed by the Roman Maestro Pietro Cangiano.
The world premiere of the work for tenor, choir and orchestra will be performed on Friday evening in St. John’s Co-Cathedral in the centre of Valletta (famous for hosting two of Caravaggio’s most famous works: the Beheading of St. John the Baptist and St. Jerome Writing) by the 80-piece Malta Philharmonic Orchestra conducted by the composer, with Italian tenor Michael Alfonsi and the Ars Cantandi choir led by Maltese Mariella Spiteri Cefai.
Originally the concert was to be held on Saturday 26, coinciding with the arrival of the ship Vespucci in Malta, but was brought forward by 24 hours to respect the day of national mourning proclaimed by the government for the funeral of Pope Francis.
The work, divided into four ‘pictures’, “retraces in music,” Cangiano explains in the notes, “the salient events of the Great Siege of Malta in 1565 as faithfully reported by Francesco Balbi da Correggio,” an arquebusiere in the service of the Spanish contingent of the Knights of St. John who were attacked by an expedition of 40,000 men sent by Sultan Suleiman the Magnificent.
Inspired by a visit to Malta by the composer, the poem opens with a prelude that recalls “the strong emotions felt on the occasion of my first voyage and the enchantment of the great light that illuminates the archipelago, the warm tone of its stone and in stark contrast to the intense blue of the sea that surrounds it” and concludes with the founding of the new city, which is now the country’s capital.