Welcome to the fourth installment of my blog series that I’m calling Story & Song. Each post will feature two pieces of music: a modern/contemporary song from the playlist of The Violinist of Venice, and a piece of Vivaldi’s music that features in the novel. I’ll describe how both pieces fit into the story with a minimum of spoilers!
Today I am again featuring my all-time favorite band: Nightwish!
Nightwish – “Slow, Love, Slow”
As you might guess after listening to this song, this goes with one of the love scenes in the book 🙂 Specifically, chapter 13. Obviously, it’s a very sexy song, both in the music and the lyrics. Something else that made it really fit the story for me, though, is the sound of the ticking clock that comes in at the very end of the song. Vivaldi and Adriana know from the beginning that their relationship is on borrowed time, and it’s time that they are always running out of. So that clock ticking away their time is also very fitting.
The Four Seasons
I think it goes without saying that The Four Seasons is Antonio Vivaldi’s most famous work – most people have heard it, even if they didn’t realize what it was or what it’s called. The Spring concerto is probably the most well known – it’s in a lot of movies and commercials and TV shows, you name it – so here I decided to include the Winter concerto, which is just gorgeous. I go back and forth on whether Winter or Summer is my favorite, but lately I like Winter, and hey, it’s seasonally appropriate as well!
The Four Seasons makes an appearance in chapter 63 of the novel, and is the first time Adriana – or indeed anyone – hears it. It’s not certain when and where The Four Seasons was first performed, so I took the liberty of supplying my own answer in the novel.
While in Venice researching the novel, I went to hear an orchestra perform The Four Seasons, and hearing that music in the very city in which Vivaldi had written it was absolutely one of the coolest experiences of my life. Not to mention that the orchestra was phenomenal!
Alyssa Palombo 