Vivaldi’s Venitian Violins

Paula Xiberras

I recently chatted to author Alyssa Palombo from her home in the Great Lakes region of Buffalo, New York. It’s a beautiful place that Alyssa lives in but she is very keen to see another beautiful place, that being Australia, which she tells me she would ‘love to go’.

Alyssa has a twin love of history and music and combines them both to crescendo point in her book ‘The Violinist of Venice’.

In the book Alyssa creates a portrait of Vivaldi, the red haired musician priest, whose hair perhaps symbolises the red blooded passion for music that runs through his veins.

The novel explores the question of what if Vivaldi met a woman in the form of Adriana D’Amato, as passionate about music as himself, with the difference being that while for him it is possible to be dedicated to both his vocation as a priest and musician she is prevented by her gender from a musical vocation. The only music she is allowed to play is that for her husband’s pleasure.

In this novel, music, through Vivaldi, the priest reaches the heavens and it is the heavens that seemingly inspired Alyssa’s writing. In a very supernatural sense she tells me that the first chapter of the book came to her in a dream!

As a qualified musician, Alyssa still performs although she does say the opera/classical world is a small field and to be a success demands total dedication which with her dual career as an author Alyssa cannot do at this time.

Alyssa will continue her celebration of the historical background of the artist in her next novel which will focus on the visual arts.

‘The Violinist of Venice’ is out now, published by Pan McMillan Australia.