PUBLISHING HOUSE
Bèrben
The Bèrben music editions were founded in 1946 in Modena by the guitarist Benedetto Berlini. Bèrben, in fact, is the acronym formed by the first three letters of the founder's surname and name. In the first years the publishing house devoted itself mainly to guitar music. For this purpose, Berlini creates the specialized magazine "L'arte chitarristica", whose numbers areToday sought after by collectors.
In 1963 Berlini sold his creature to Bio Boccosi, a musician from Ancona who moved the headquarters of the publishing house to the Marche region. Boccosi at the time was director of Farfisa, an industry in the Marches that produced musical instruments (accordions and organs) and a few years earlier had taken over the Farfisa editions.
Thanks to his entrepreneurial skills he gives life to a rich organization of highly popular educational-musical events and unites all his activities in a single publishing house. Among its main merits, it stimulates the creation of a quality accordion repertoire to which composers such as Alfano, Pozzoli, Casagrande, Liviabella, Ferrari Trecate contribute.
In those same years Fabio Boccosi, son of Bio, joined the company and further raised the quality of the guitar catalog by relying on the advice of the Italian composer, who took refuge in California to escape the racial laws, Mario Castelnuovo-Tedesco.
The Florentine composer informs the publisher of the young guitarist and composer from Vercelli Angelo Gilardino to whom the Bèrben editions entrust the creation of an impressive series of original music for guitar.
Thanks to Gilardino, superintendent of the Segovia Foundation, Bèrben becomes the protagonist of a historic event: the publication of the entire Segovia Archive, the admirable collection of unpublished scores which, after the death of the legendary Spanish guitarist, were made available by the heirs.
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«We are happy and proud of this important acquisition- hasdeclared Alfredo Gramitto Ricci, president of Edizioni Curci -.The Bèrben catalog is a point of reference for musicians from all over the world and has a place of honor in the history of Italian music publishing. We will make all our experience and distribution capacity available to enhance its quality and identity».
JULY 1919.
CURCI ACQUIRES
THE BERBEN PUBLISHING HOUSE
From 1 July 2019, the Marche music catalogue, 70 years of history and a reference point for music professionals and enthusiasts, was acquired by Edizioni Curci of Milan, which strengthens their market leading position. The Bèrben catalog includes important composers such as Mario Castelnuovo-Tedesco, Astor Piazzolla, Nino Rota, Alexander Tansman, Leo Brouwer and Angelo Gilardino.
The flagship is the Segovia Archive with the complete publication of the unpublished scores made available after the death of the legendary Andalusian guitarist.
The Bèrben of Ancona is fromToday owned by Edizioni Curci of Milan. This is an important acquisition in a market, that of printed music editions, which in Italy is worth 6.8 million euros (Dismamusica 2017 data).
Curci is among the oldest Italian music publishing houses, born in Naples in 1860 and then moved to Milan, stillToday firmly in the hands of the founding family. Known and appreciated all over the world thanks to an impressive catalog of light and popular music which includes, among others, the most important hits by Domenico Modugno, Giovanni D'Anzi, Giorgio Gaber, and more recently, Vasco Rossi, Tiziano Ferro, Claudio Baglioni and Antonello Venditti, Curci has simultaneously developed an important catalog of classical, operatic and didactic music, which includes composers such as Pietro Mascagni, Francesco Cilea, Ildebrando Pizzetti, Mario Castelnuovo-Tedesco, Astor Piazzolla; reviewers and interpreters such as Artur Schnabel, Karl Fisher, Alfred Cortot, Carlo Zecchi, Franco Gulli, and famous teachers such as Alberto Curci, Alessandro Longo, Antonio Trombone and, more recently, Remo Vinciguerra and Vito Nicola Paradiso.
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With the acquisition of the Bèrben editions of Ancona, Curci secures the Marche catalog which, founded in 1946, is known throughout the world thanks to the presence of important pieces by authors such as Mario Castelnuovo-Tedesco (such as the 24 Caprichos de Goya for guitar) ; Astor Piazzolla (Cinco Piezas, Grand Tango, Tango Suite); Nino Rota (Concerto for bassoon and orchestra); Bruno Maderna (Concerto for oboe and orchestra), Leo Brouwer (Concerto No. 5 of Helsinki for guitar and orchestra).
The guitar repertoire includes compositions by authors of great prestige, such as Alexander Tansman, Andrés Segovia, Ferenc Farkas, Ida Presti and Angelo Gilardino. Among the teaching volumes there are bestsellers such as Julio Sagreras' first lessons for guitar, Giuseppe Gariboldi's 58 exercises for transverse flute, the Bèrben method for accordion, the saxophone method by Jean-Marie Londeix, as well as highly prestigious series such as that of the Segovia Archive and the Presti-Lagoya Collection.
Photo: ANDREA CHERCHI
