Nabokov, Nicolas [Nikolay]

Nakič [Nakik], Petar.

See Nachini, Pietro.

Naksawat, Uthit

(b Samut Songkhram, Thailand, 1923, d 1982). Thai composer, performer and writer on music. An economist by training (obtaining the doctorate in Economics from Cornell University) he began composing for the radio station of the Ministry of Education while holding a professorship in economics at Kasetsat University. Naksawat was a close disciple of Luang Pradit Phairau, studying with him from 1945 until the teacher's death in 1954. In the 1960s and 70s he was part of a broader movement to reinvigorate Thai music by bringing it to the masses through radio and television. In 1960, soon after television came to Thailand, he presented ‘The Advancement of Thai Music’, a programme so popular that it led to another, ‘Dr. Uthit and Thai Music’, that ran for almost 20 years.

Naksawat left behind an impressive body of accomplishments. He wrote numerous newspaper and magazine articles about Thai music history, playing techniques, theoretical concepts and performers' life histories. He eventually assembled some of these essays into the book The Theory and Practice of Thai Music (1968), an unusual and important publication about Thai classical music in addressing the musical concepts underpinning classical music to a general audience. Naksawat's programmes and writings were very popular with the Thai public, and it is largely due to his efforts that the 1970s and 80s saw a surge of middle-class interest in classical music, with many parents arranging for their children to take lessons in Thai rather than Western music.

DEBORAH WONG

Naldi, Antonio [Il Bardella]

(d Florence, 25 Jan 1621). Italian lutenist and singer, inventor of the chitarrone. Sometimes styled ‘bolognese’ (and probably related to the Bolognese composer Romolo Naldi), he was associated with the Medici court in Florence from 1571, and by 1588 he was custodian of the court’s musical instruments. In 1609 his salary was a high 16 scudi per month, comparable with that of Giulio Caccini. He is recorded often as performing at court, sometimes as a singer (e.g. in the first of the intermedi for the wedding of Grand Duke Ferdinando I and Christine of Lorraine in 1589) but chiefly as an instrumentalist. Emilio de’ Cavalieri credited him with the invention of the chitarrone (in a letter to Luzzasco Luzzaschi of 1592; see Prunières) – Naldi seems to have designed and first used the instrument in the 1589 intermedi – and his virtuosity on the instrument was praised by Caccini in the preface to Le nuove musiche (1601/2/R). Naldi acted as a guarantor of the castrato Onofrio Gualfreducci for his appointment as sacristan of S Lorenzo in 1593, and recommended Antonio Brunelli for the post of maestro di cappella of S Stefano in Pisa in 1612. Francesco Rasi noted that although Naldi lived ‘sordidamente’, he left some 24,000 scudi on his death, an astonishing amount.

BIBLIOGRAPHY

SolertiMBD

H. Prunières: ‘Une lettre inédite d’Emilio del Cavaliere’, ReM, iv/8 (1922–3), 128–33

C.V. Palisca: ‘Musical Asides in the Diplomatic Correspondence of Emilio de’ Cavalieri’, MQ, xlix (1963), 339–55; repr. in Studies in the History of Italian Music and Music Theory (Oxford, 1994), 389–407

D.P. Walker, ed.: Musique des intermèdes de ‘La Pellegrina’, Les fêtes du mariage de Ferdinand de Médicis et de Christine de Lorraine, Florence, 1589, i (Paris, 1963)

D.A. Smith: ‘On the Origins of the Chitarrone’, JAMS, xxxii (1979), 440–62

M. Fabbri: ‘La collezione medicea degli strumenti musicali in due sconosciuti inventari del primo Seicento’, NA, new ser., i (1983), 51–62

P. Gargiulo: ‘Strumenti alla corte medicea: nuovi documenti e sconosciuti inventari (1553–1609)’, NA, new ser., iii (1985), 55–71

W. Kirkendale: The Court Musicians in Florence during the Principate of the Medici (Florence, 1993)

TIM CARTER

Naldi, Hortensio

(b ?Piacenza; fl 1606–7). Italian composer. All that is known of his life is that he lived at Cento, Emilia, in 1606, the year in which his Psalmi omnes qui … in solemnitatibus decantari solent, cum 2 Magnificat, et falsi bordoni … lib.I, for four voices and instruments, appeared at Venice. This was followed by the Concerti ecclesiastici for one to four voices with basso continuo (Venice, 1607). These two sacred collections point up the divergence between a conventional polyphonic style for psalms and a novel concertato texture for motets. One of the latter was reprinted in a German anthology (RISM 1626²); it sets the words Pulchra es O Maria for SATB and is unified by a triple-time refrain, as were many early four-part concertato motets.

JEROME ROCHE

Naldi [Naldo, Naldio], Romolo [Romulo]

(b ?Bologna, mid-16th century; d Rome, 21 May 1612). Italian composer and organist. He was a doctor of theology and of civil and canon law, and was named a Knight of St Peter’s and cross-bearer to the pope. According to Fétis, he was organist of the Dominican church in Ferrara, but he is documented in Rome for a number of years after 1585. He was second organist of S Luigi dei Francesi in January 1585 and again from July 1587 to September 1590, and was probably the only organist there between January 1591 and March 1592. He was also in Rome in 1600 when he signed the dedication of the book of motets to his patron Cardinal Inico d’Avalos. Naldi is noted primarily for this volume which includes two works for 12 voices and one for 16.

WORKS

Il primo libro de madrigali, 5vv (Venice, 1589)

Mottectorum … liber primus, 2 choirs (Venice, 1600); 3 ed. in Monumenta liturgiae polychoralis, IV/A2, IV/B2 (Trent, 1969)

Secular work, 1587^6; motets, 1611^1, 1615^2

Several MS works, D-MÜp, I-Rvat

BIBLIOGRAPHY

FétisB

H.-W. Frey: ‘Die Kapellmeister an der französischen Nationalkirche San Luigi dei Francesi in Rom im 16. Jahrhundert’, AMw, xxiii (1966), 32–60, esp. 53

RUTH I. DeFORD