Franco Casavola - Break From Futurism

Break From Futurism

In 1927, Casavola radically revised his views, and chose to break decisively from the Futurist movement. In truth his musical direction had already begun to display increasingly lyrical and refined qualities.

Casavola subsequently claimed to have destroyed his Futurist scores, though this is not entirely true. The location and cataloguing of many of his lost scores is the result of diligent research by Grazia Sebastiani and musicological studies by Pierfranco Moliterni. The result is that today, Casavola, like fellow futurist Silvio Mix, stands as one of the most interesting Italian experimental composers of the 1920s. Certainly his status equals that of the five composers defined by Massimo Mila as 'la generazione dell'Ottanta' : Gian Francesco Malipiero, Alfredo Casella, Ottorino Respighi (who taught Casavola), Ildebrando Pizzetti and Franco Alfano.