THE SANGRO VALLEY—AT PEACE

New Zealand Listener, Volume 10, Issue 239, 21 January 1944, Page 6

THE SANGRO VALLEY—AT PEACE

A few weeks ago New Zealand was reading about the hardship its soldiers were enduring in the Sangro Valley, in Italy. Now a reader has sent us two copies of an English paper, "Musical Opinion," in which an Englishman tells how he spent more than two years in the same valley after Italy had declared war on Britain. He is John Compton, a well-known organ-builder, and he writes chiefly of his encounters with the ancient and dilapidated organs of the valley’s various churches, but he also gives an amusing picture of wartime life in rustic Italy, and throws some light on villagers’ feelings about the war, and their behaviour towards a citizen of an enemy country, so we reproduce here some parts of what he wrote.

HEN Mussolini declared \X/ war against the Allies, I was at Capri, not yet recovered from an acute arthritic trouble that had prevented me from returning to England, and on June 13, 1940, I was arrested as were nearly all the other British subjects in Italy. After ten days of convalescence in

the Peace Hospital at Naples, and twenty days in the immense and notorious prison of Poggiareale, I was liberated, and the Prefect of Naples, after some discussion, gave me a letter of introduction to the Podesta (Mayor) of Villa Santa Maria, a commune of three villages in the foothills of the central Apennines. On the morrow, I took leave of my friends in Naples; the next day I visited those in Rome and at Tivoli; I spent the third day swimming in the warm waters of the Adriatic and basking on the sandy beach of Pescara and then proceeded in leisurely fashion to Villa, some twenty miles up the valley of the Sangro. I was received very cordially by the Podesta, who recommended an inn, but assured me that I was free to live wherever I liked, go wherever I liked within the commune, and do as I liked so long as I kept the peace! One of my earliest friendships here was with the parish priest, Don Vincenzo Maiocco, a saintly old soul, who passed to his rest a few months after my arrival. He invited me to see the organs in the churches of Villa, and finding that I was able to extract more or less pleasing music from them, he asked me to play the one in the Great Church on Sundays and Saints’ days, and also those in the smaller churches

on the rare occasions when they sang Mass. He explained that his organist had died two years before, and that thenceforth all the organs had perforce remained dumb, except that Maestro Domenico had sometimes come down from Pietraferazzano to play for important funerals: Maestro Domenico (I do not know his surname: such vanities as surnames are of little account in the Sangro valley) is the shoemaker, and I

can well believe that he used to make very good shoes in the days when leather was still to be found in the Abruzzi. I have heard him play at his own church; he is honest, but not ambitious, and he does not try to play voluntaries or "sonatinas." In the accompaniment of the Mass, he plays the melody with the thumb and forefinger of the right hand, and with the left hand he sounds a single chord (always of D or F for he knows only the "Missa de Angelis") whenever he thinks it will go well with the melody note; and his judgment in this matter is good, misfits being rare. I found all the organs of Villa in unplayable condition: the rackboards covered to a depth of several inches with cobwebs, dead swallows, walnut shells, paper pellets et hoc genus omne. I spent two months in cleaning and adjusting two of them, and then started my career as honorary organ-grinder to the commune. For the next few weeks, I was not able to do much more than play an unobtrusive accompaniment to the read Mass. I avoided improvisation as much as possible, for it soon becomes tiresome to the listener, no matter how interesting it may be to the player. By this time, I had the liberty of the whole commune, and a free hand to do

as I thought fit with any or all of its five church organs. But where to find the new materials? During two-and-a-half years, I was unable to buy half a skin of leather or a board of seasoned timber. Glue was said to be worth its weight in platinum, but nobody had any. Metals, in sheet, tube or wire, were only quoted on the mercato nero, and so (with infinite regret) I had to tell my good friends at Villa and Buonanotte (a good name for a sleepy village!) and Montelapiano and more distant places that they must wait till after the war. "Then why can‘t you drop some big bombs on the Palazzo Venezia and finish the war?" they used to say. During my sojourn in the Abruzzi, I enjoyed better general health than I had for many years past. The longevity of the people in these parts is remarkable: in our village of four thousand souls, there were at least two reputed centenarians and scores of people over ninety, most of them still doing their daily work in the fields and in the vineyards. This has been attributed to our extreme simplicity of jife in these mid-Apennine provinces, to the exceptional purity of the mountain air, to the wholesome qualities of the wines we made, and to our habit of drinking them in unmeasured quantities. Suchsfactors as these may contribute to one’s well-being in a considerable measure, but there are others, perhaps more subtle: the rough but genuine friendliness of the contadini, the warm and insistent affection of the children, the sylvan beauty of the Sangro valley and the mountains that rise about it, the daily call to some useful and interesting work .... The Simple Life There is an exquisite little church down the valley, the Chiesa della Madonna. It stands in a real village green, so perfect that it might almost be English. The sycamores and acacias give grateful shade from the sun’s scorching rays and one or two conifers and oleanders add to the charm of the the scene. The turf is close cropped by the sheep and goats that graze there from morning to sunset. At times a new dropped lamb strays and gets lost, but he has only to bleat once or twice and the shepherd or shepherdess picks him up and takes him back to his dam. In the Sangro Valley you can see and hear lambs and chickens all the year round. The Madonna Church is small, but its design and acoustic properties are perfect, with nave and sanctuary, transept and aisle all stone vaulted, five domed chapels, a large dome at the crossing and a really beautiful marble floor. I began the work of repairing its organ in the early winter of 1940, after a week of. rainy weather. The roadway to the church, remade and widened by Austrian prisoners of war in 1918 and never repaired since, was daily becoming more muddy and impassable; and in mid-November I cajoled my young helpers into carrying several tons of flattish stones from the river bed and making a rough but serviceable pavement. Before the next winter, however, my precious paving stones had been "borrowed" by the contadini to mend their garden walls or to fortify the dykes they had built for the irrigation of their vineyards. They knew of a certainty that the good natured Signor Giovanni had brought these rocks (continued on next page)

(continued from previous page) from the river for their benefit; and although they did not mind walking along a puddly road in rainy weather, it was essential that the vigneta should be well watered in the dry season. Italians Tired of Pretending After several weeks my task was finished. Then for many days there was a@ procession of visitors who wanted to hear the organ that had been mute for

two decades. Some of these visitorsmostly young men-did not show much concern for the organ after the first few minutes of courteous attention; they only wanted to talk with the Inglese who had done such useful work for their church and commune without payment and for no apparent reason. What was his opinion as to the probable duration of the war? They had no illusions as to its ultimate results. They were tired of shouting "Duce, Duce!" and of pretending that roasted barley was as good as real coffee; their chief desire was for a quick finish, but preferably an anti-Fascist one. Was he pleased with Don Pasquale’s new bowling alley? What chance did he think the visiting team would have in the forthcoming Sunday’s football match, Villa v. Pescara? What was his estimate of the weight of Donna Lucia’s fat pig that was due to be killed on the vigil of San Silvestro? This church has no pews or chairs. It is only used a few times in the year. Some people bring their own chairs, but most of them stand or promenade on the marble floor, even though the service should last two hours or more, as it did at one annual festival when all the villagers of Monteferrante descended from their mountain and took complete possession of the church. Their priest said the Mass and their women and girls did the chanting and howling, and the clergy and parishioners of Villa were nonentities for the day. When it became evident that the organ would not be ‘needed, I told my organ-blowers, to their delight, that we would go blackberrying for the day instead. A Village in the Apennines Just after mid-day we met Don Roberto, the Podesta, who was out on the hillside with his dogs and gun. For politeness sake, I hailed him: "Cavalliere, buon giorno! What luck have you had?" He had been lucky enough or skilful enough to bag two fat hares and a brace or two of pheasant, and so was in good humour. He said: "When are

you going up to sample Don Gennaro’s moscato? He wants you to mend his organ." Don Gennaro’s village is high up in the mountains within sight of the highest peaks of the Apennine range. In winter time, the houses are sometimes covered for days or weeks with deep snowdrifts, and the villagers are accustomed to excavate tunnels through the snow from house to house, with ventilating shafts here and there, so contriving to keep up a certain measure of social intercourse. Arriving in due course at Don Gennaro’s rectory, I found that the good padre had allotted me the school house, the most modern and convenient house in the paesetto, and that his own table and his most excellent cellar and his whole household were at my service for as long as I might be willing to stay in the parish. Imagine, then, my real dismay when I examined the organ and found that I could do next to nothing for these kindly people. Their hundred-and-fifty year old organ had been completely ruined by rust and worm. After twenty days I told Don Gennaro I could do no more. Having made all the dumb pipes to speak again, and adjusted all the mechanisms so far as they were capable of being adjusted, I took my leave and returned to my inn in the valley. But two days later came | a messenger from Don Gennaro: "Will you play the organ for us on Sunday?" It was a brilliant Sunday morning, and as soon as I came within sight of the mountain top village the church bells began to clang. Perhaps "clang" is not the kindest word to use; but they certainly did not peal or ring or do any of the things that church bells are supposed to do. Perhaps "clank" or "jangle" would better describe the effect. They are sounded, in most of these villages, by a number of small boys presumably under the threat of excommunication by the sacristan, who pays them little or nothing for their hard work. There is no rhythm, no ordered sequence; each boy swings the heavy clapper of his tu.. as fast as he can and takes no notice of the others. Evviva The watchers on the church tower had seen the gleam of my white flannels in the sunlight as I came over the last crest two kilometres distant, and were broadcasting the news that there would be High Mass that day, con organo. Don Gennaro’s sermon was short and strange. He told of the wretched condition of the.old organ before my advent and of the marvels that had been wrought to make it play again. His final exhortation was delivered very fervently in a tongue I did not understand very well-it was probably pure Napoletano-and [I did not fully comprehend its purport until ‘the whole congregation rose and faced west, saluting (but not with the Fascist salute) and hailing: "Evviva! Evviva!" It was an embarrassing moment. These poor people had been assured that I had made the organ as good as new, and no doubt it sounded’so to them, for many of the younger ones had never heard an organ before. I alone knew how thoroughly rotten it was; that it could not remain playable more than a few weeks or months; and that sooner or later it must topple over into the church, a nasty mess of dust and putrescence. But they are a good-hearted folk, and I am sure they will always believe that the crazy foreigner did his best for them. even though he was not able to control the elements or exterminate the rust and the worm from the church furniture.