Martina Forni
*6 November 1979
Works by Martina Forni
Biography
The Italian violist Martina Forni grew up surrounded by many kinds of music. The equally diverse musical activities she would later employ, from baroque to contemporary music passing through jazz and Argentinian tango, turned her into an eclectic musician.
She is passionate about arranging music for the Amsterdam based Ensemble Lumaka, the award-winning quintet of which she is a founding member.
Martina graduated at both the Conservatorio di Verona and the Conservatorium van Amsterdam. Among her teachers and mentors were Nobuko Imai, Michael Gieler, Umberto Forni and Anner Bylsma.
In 2013 she joined the viola section of the Concertgebouw orchestra. Previously she was a member of the Netherlands Radio Philharmonic Orchestra and played with the Rotterdam Philharmonic Orchestra, the London Philharmonic Orchestra and Asko|Schönberg for many years.
She also plays baroque viola and has been principal violist of Anima Eterna Brugge, Ensemble Zefiro and La Chambre Philharmonique.
Martina enjoys teaching viola and chamber music. In 2019 and 2020 she gave masterclasses to the South African Youth Orchestra, at the ILYO in Poland, and since 2020 is teaching music performance on original instrument at the Mahler Chamber Orchestra Summer Academy in Dobbiaco.
About the music
What can be nicer than becoming a child again while listening to Ravel’s ‘Ma Mère l’Oye’?
The fairy tale atmosphere is palpable through the whole piece. The music evokes each single character and the enchanting nature that surrounds them.
When arranging it for harp quintet I had in my hands both the original piano-duo score and the colourful orchestral version.
The quintet has plenty of possibilities in its palette: the simplicity of the chamber music setting, but also a great range of dynamics and effects which we would expect from a much larger ensemble.
This will make you feel as you were reading Charles Perrault ’s Tales of Mother Goose with the help of a little light, in your bed, hiding under the blankets. There, thanks to your imagination, you would think of an infinite room all around you, an image full of forests, birds, beasts and princesses.
I am happy to make my little contribution to the repertoire of the harp-flute quintet.
I want to thank, from the bottom of my heart, my friends from the Ensemble Lumaka and Wilbert Bulsink, for helping me to learn how to write for instruments which are not mine and for bringing this arrangement to life!