A Dictionary of Music and Musicians/Stornello
STORNELLO. 'A short poem, in lines of eleven syllables each: it is peculiar to, and liked by, the people in Tuscany, who extemporise it with elegant simplicity.' This is the definition of Stornello we find in Mons. Tommaseo's Dictionary, and, in this matter at least, we are not aware of any greater authority. The 'Vocabolario degli Accademici della Crusca,' the stronghold of the purity of the Italian language, does not contain the word: this fact, added to the other, not less significant, that neither Crescimbeni, nor Quadrio, nor Tiraboschi, mention the word in their elaborate works, inclines us to believe that the word Stornello has not the definite meaning that, for instance, Sonnetto has; but is merely a name given in some parts of Italy to very short poems, more with regard to their purport than their form. Tommaseo again, somewhere else, speaking of Tonio and Beatrice, two peasants who sang and recited popular songs and popular poems to him, says: 'Tonio makes a difference between Rispetti and Ramanzetti: the latter are composed of only three lines, the former of eight or ten. And those that Tonio called Ramanzetti Beatrice called Strambotti, as Matteo Spinello and King Manfredi did; and in the territory of Pistoja and in Florence they are distinguished by the name of Stornelli.' Although in the true popular songs of Italy there is a great freedom in the number of lines and rules of rhyming, the two Stornelli we subjoin may bo taken as fair examples of this kind of poem.[1]
(1)Tutta la notte in sogno mi venito:
Ditemi, bella mia, perche lo fate?
Echi viene da voi quando dormite?
(2) Fiori di pepe.
So giro intorno a voi come fa l'ape
Che gira intorno al fiore della siepe.
The first line may contain either five or eleven syllables; the other two are of eleven syllables each. The first line rhymes with the third, i.e. the two have the last syllable, and the vowel of the last syllable but one, alike: the intermediate line, while corresponding in its last syllable with the last syllable of the other two lines, changes the vowel of the accented one.
The etymology of 'Stornello' is very uncertain: Tommaseo, however, has some ground for asserting that it is a corruption of 'Ritornello,' or 'refrain.'- ↑ From Tigri's 'Canto Populare Toscani' (Florence, 1869).