Eccentric morning on July 1, ideally inspired by the surreal imagery of Hieronymus Bosch. The program's first oddity is - right from its title - theAria "l'Emenfrodito": marrying together the Gallina and Cucco make a beautiful concerto that the Romagnolo Marco Uccellini included among the Sonate, arie et correnti edite to Venezia in 1642 with a dedication to the Duke of Modena, his employer. The score calls for three instrumental parts, two violins and basso continuo, which in the three minutes of duration chirp a lot; but it is a chirping mixed to some cuccù, as if the animal portrayed in the notes were the result of a freakish hybridization.

Even more visionary is the extravagant Capriccio by Carlo Farina, a violinist of Mantuan origin who in his short life served courts and churches halfway across Europe, leaving a lasting musical legacy, especially to his German colleagues. In 1627, the date of composition of this'opera, he was first violinist in the Dresden orchestra at the Electoral Prince Johann Georg I of Saxony. The Capriccio is shaped on the dimensions of a string ensemble, a complex that was then, under the influence of English consorts, gaining ground in north-central Germany. In the multitude of sections that comprise it, sandwiched between short slow or svelte episodes to character of dance, the instruments are called to to counterfeit other instruments (lyre and fifes of all sorts, Spanish guitar, trumpet, clarinet, castanets, drum) and animal verses (hen, rooster, cat, dog), often using performance techniques to astonishing effect, such as pizzicato, glissando, tremolo, the wood of the bow slammed on the strings. Effects no less stunning are also present in the Battalia by Heinrich Iganz Franz von Biber, one of the most eminent violin virtuosos of the 17th century who served the prince-archbishop of Salzburg for decades. From 1673 is this "battle" (a descriptive genre frequented quite a bit by musicians, since the Renaissance) divided into eight parts, perhaps conceived as a pantomime for a carnival masquerade. First there is a "Sonata," in one passage of which the instrumentalists must, again, bang their bows on the strings and/or stamp their feet on the floor. For second comes the part entitled "The Dissolute Company of All Sorts of Humor," in which Biber superimposes German, Czech and Slovak folk melodies producing a great cacophony, justified by the fact that one imagines to singing completely tipsy soldiers there. Then a "Presto" introduces the battle (called "Mars"), where the bass violone is instructed to insert a sheet of paper between the strings to emulate the roll of war drums. This is followed by another "Presto," then an "Aria" that could be a prayer of the troops and finally the "Battle" proper in which the bass instruments are required to snap their strings against the keyboard, to simulating cannon shots. Finally the tearful "Lament of the Wounded Musketeers."

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With Olivier Messiaen we move from the imitation of nature to the transhumanation of creation. Indeed, the French composer, deeply religious and for decades titular of the great organ of the Parisian Church of the Trinity, believed in the immanence of God and, like a modern Saint Francis ornithologist, loved birds. InAlouette-lulu, "tottavilla" in Italian, he records the song of this jaunty bird from he heard in the 1950s in the French province of Forez. Songs of various other birds, including blackbird, nightingale, robin, he reproduces with identical minuteness in Chants d'oiseaux (1951), for the purpose of worthily celebrating Easter. Their voice, which Messiaen says is "the model and source for all music," alludes to "mystical flight, religious joy and spiritual freedom," and resounds "purifying, pacifying, comforting." Roman composer Alessandro Annunziata has translated these two pages for strings from the keyboard originals; and he adds his own Hummingbird Dance from the 2004 Trio.

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