It’s usually not very difficult to recognize a violinist on the street. The machine-gun-case is an obvious tipoff.  And if that doesn’t keep people from coming closer, then the “hickey” on the neck (where the violin rubs the skin), a sure sign of a passionate player, might lead others to keep their distance. Often these musicians look like they’d benefit from a good chiropractic adjustment.

But what drew me to say “hello” to the case-toting students I met in the Piazza today was something different–a smile? a shared language? or maybe just the fact that we were all looking for the Urbino Early Music Festival? 

I walked over to the baroque violin class with my new friends, Kim and Stijn, and asked the teacher (Stefano Montanari), in broken Italian, if I could sit in on the class. He answered, in perfect English, that I was welcome to do so. There were eight other violinists there, and each one played for about half an hour, during which time Maestro Montanari alternated between demonstrating phrases on his violin, accompanying them on the harpsichord, singing, and playing various other combinations of these instruments simultaneously.

He spoke primarily in English, since most of the students were foreign and not fluent in Italian.  But during the Italian students’ lessons he spoke Italian, with a few interspersed phrases of English to clarify for the observing students. Most of the time, however, this was unnecessary. Italian is the traditional language of music.  So when I got to Italy, I was well-equipped to ask someone to sing to me with much vivacity, at a gradually accelerating tempo, but not so well equipped to ask for a bathroom. But even more than the large degree of overlapping musical vocabulary, Montanari’s playing and singing communicated vast amounts of information that were incapable of translation, and required none.

Stefano Montanari (foreground), a baroque violinist, accompanies a student on the harpsichord during a masterclass at the Urbino Early Music Festival