'Lost' Vivaldi found in Scotland after 300 years

A LOST Vivaldi flute concerto will get its world premiere in Scotland three centuries after it was written after the only surviving score was discovered in the National Archives of Scotland.

Il Gran Molo is one of four famous "lost" concertos by Antonio Vivaldi. The manuscript copy was probably bought by Lord Robert Kerr, a flute-playing Scottish nobleman who was killed while fighting for the Jacobites at Culloden.

It was discovered earlier this year by a university researcher, Andrew Woolley, who described it yesterday as a "once in a lifetime" find. A leading international authority on the composer, Professor Michael Talbot, who authenticated the manuscript, called it "quintessentially Vivaldian".

The concerto will get its full premiere at Perth Concert Hall in January. But flautist John Hall, who played a short section of the slow movement at the archives building yesterday, said: "It's absolutely typical Vivaldi. It couldn't be anything else. It's beautifully written for the instrument, very lyrical. It's in there, in its genes, typical Vivaldi.

"The great composers didn't really write very much for the flute. Vivaldi has quite a lot of flute concertos already but to have another one in the bag is another string to your bow, so to speak."

The concerto was effectively "hiding in plain sight" in the archives. "It's been in our possession for quite a long time, it's even been in our catalogue, but we are archivists and did not realise the significance" until Woolley came to research it, said George MacKenzie, Keeper of the Records of Scotland.

The manuscript was part of the family papers of the Marquesses of Lothian, acquired by the archives in 1991. It is thought Lord Kerr, son of the 3rd Marquess, bought it on a "Grand Tour" of Europe in the early 18th century.

The manuscript is not in Vivaldi's hand. But it is titled Il Gran Mogol and appears to be a contemporary copy of his work by a professional Italian musician or copyist.

Il Gran Mogol, named for the Mughal Empire or India, is one of four flute concertos listed as Vivaldi's work in an 18th century catalogue, all since lost. The others also carried "national" titles: La Francia, La Spagna, and L'Inghilterro.

A later version of the Il Gran Mogol is held in Turin, Italy, but it is a reworked, simplified concerto in a different key that lacks the slow movement.Vivaldi often wrote several different versions of his pieces, with different names, allowing the Scottish manuscript to be classified as a completely new work.

"Thanks to the uncovering of this manuscript we can now add one more authentic solo woodwind concerto to those belonging to Vivaldi's later period," said Mr Woolley, including the "exquisite central slow movement".

Mr Woolley, who moved to Edinburgh last year, is a lay clerk at St Mary's Episcopal Church but remains a research fellow at the University of Southampton.

Musicologists had not investigated the manuscript before, he said, because the National Archives are not known for their musical holdings.