Faà di Bruno, Giovanni Matteo [Horatio, Orazio] 83

Furiant

(Cz.: ‘a proud, swaggering, conceited man’, pl. furianty). A Czech couple-dance, in moderate to fast tempo, in triple time with hemiola-type syncopations. The hemiolas generally occur at the beginning, helping momentarily to confuse the metre, rather than as part of a cadential formula. A furiant typically begins with two 3/4 bars stressed, however, as three bars of 2/4, followed by two ordinary 3/4 bars. It is one of the constituent dances of the Beseda.

The word ‘furiant’ first occurs in the 1770s in a broadside ballad Chvála sedláků (‘In Praise of Farmers’) and in Jan Antoš's Opera de rebellione boëmica rusticorum (1777), used there in the sense ‘disturber of the peace’, ‘rebel’. A folksong with hemiola characteristics and with a text featuring the word ‘furiant’ was first recorded in Rittersberk's collection, though with a German text: ‘Furiant, furiant, furiant, du bist mein lieba Monn’ (Prague, 1825; ed. in Markl, 549). A Czech version with the same tune, but set to satirical words about an arrogant peasant, ‘Sedlák, sedlák, sedlák’, can be found in K.M. Jiříček's manuscript collection Zpěvník (‘Songbook’; 1845–62; CZ-Pnm) and in Erben (1842, text; 1862, tune, ex.1 and other early Czech folksong collections.

The early history of the furiant is unclear. Markl suggests a French origin (‘Fou-riant’), possibly going back to the Napoleonic wars. German theorists record a dance called a ‘Furie’, operatic in origin (Walther ML), whose character (fast and furious) was suggested by its name. Türk (1789) mentions ‘sharp accents’; both he and Quantz (1752) define its metre as either in common time or in 3/4. There are several reasons why this may be a different dance from the Czech furiant: the character of the German ‘Furie’ is ‘fiery’ (Quantz), the speed fast and the metre either duple or triple, whereas the earliest Czech accounts of the furiant imply a dance in moderate or slow tempo of a whimsical, hesitant or even humorous nature (Zvonař), and with the metre alternating in some way. Zvonař (1863) provided the first precise description of the dance's metrical structure. Jungmann (1835) defines it as ‘a dance whose first half resembles a skočná [i.e. in 2/4] with arms akimbo, the second is danced almost as a German dance [i.e. a ländler]’, a description taken further by Waldau (1859): ‘the dancer imitates a proud puffed-up farmer: his arms akimbo, he stamps with his feet, pulls his skirt outwards’. His partner has to mark time until, in the second half they dance a ‘serious and slow sousedská in the metre of a ländler’. By 1869, when Smetana added a named furiant to The Bartered Bride, the tempo had become ‘Allegro energico’ (the tune is clearly modelled on ex.1). Thereafter the furiant was commonly used by Czech nationalist composers. In addition to replacing the scherzo with a furiant in his Seventh Symphony, Dvořák used named furianty in his Slavonic Dances, in piano works (b85, b137) and as movements of chamber works (b80, b155). Examples are also found in 20th-century works by Křička, Vítězslav Novák and Weinberger.

BIBLIOGRAPHY

MGG1 suppl. (P. Nettl); SČHK (H. Laudová) [incl. further bibliography]; Walther ML

J.J. Quantz: Versuch einer Anweisung die Flöte traversiere zu spielen (Berlin, 1752, 3/1789/R; various edns and trans.)

D.G. Türk: Clavierschule (Leipzig and Halle, 1789, 2/1802/R; Eng. trans., abridged, 1804)

J. Jungmann: ‘Furiant’, Slownjk česko-německý [German-Czech dictionary], i (Prague, 1835)

K.J. Erben: Pjsně národnj w Čechách [Folksongs in Bohemia], i (Prague, 1842) [text only]; definitive edn as Prostonárodní české písně a říkadla (1862, tunes; 1864 text)

A. Waldau [J. Jarosch]: Böhmische Nationaltänze: eine Culturstudie, i (Prague, 1859), 31–2

L. Zvonař: ‘Furiant’, Rieger: Slovník naučný, iii (Prague, 1863)

J. Markl: Nejstarší sbírky českých lidových písní [The oldest collections of Czech folksongs] (Prague, 1987), 184–5

J. Tyrrell: Czech Opera (Cambridge, 1988)

JOHN TYRRELL

Furió, Pedro

(b Alicante; fl 1734–80). Spanish composer. His earliest documented post was as a singer at the parish church of S María, Elche (1734); since he was already a priest he was then probably about 27 years old. His next recorded posts were as maestro de capilla at S Miguel in Andújar (1750), the collegiate church of S Sebastián, Antequera (4 Dec 1750), the royal chapel in Granada (1755), the parish church of S Martín in Valencia (1756), Guadix Cathedral (1770) and at León (1770). In 1767 he was appointed singer, though not maestro de capilla, at the cathedral of Santiago. His last known position, from 20 March 1775, was as maestro de capilla at Oviedo Cathedral, which he seems to have left in 1779 or 1780. His compositions, all in manuscript, survive in various Spanish churches and cathedrals. Particularly important are a book of masses ‘in stile antico’ in León Cathedral, and a collection of Lamentations for Holy Week, in ornate bel canto style, in Santiago.

BIBLIOGRAPHY

G. Bourligueux: ‘Apuntes sobre los maestros de capilla de la catedral de Oviedo (1724–1823)’, Boletín del Instituto de Estudios Asturianos, xxv (1971), 659–712 [incl. list of works]

J. López-Calo: Catálogo musical del archivo de la Santa Iglesia Catedral de Santiago (Cuenca, 1972, rev. 2/1992–3 as La música en la Catedral de Santiago), iii, 255ff

E. Casares: La música en la catedral de Oviedo (Oviedo, 1980), 161ff

J. Castaño García: ‘La música en la iglesia de Santa María de Elche’, Cabanilles, nos.18–20 (1986), 13–164

J. López-Calo: Catálogo del archivo de musica de la capilla real de Granada (Granada, 1993–4), i, 302–3; ii, 133ff

JOSÉ LÓPEZ-CALO