The Four Seasons: La primavera, op. 8 no. 1

La primavera, the first of The Four Seasons, opens with the most quoted ritornello Vivaldi wrote. Its sonnet moves from birdsong and a murmuring stream to a thunderstorm, then to a sleeping goatherd whose dog barks beside him; Vivaldi writes the dog into the viola part, marked to be played roughly and without variation. The finale is a pastoral dance over a drone bass. The concerto is in E major, and it was the piece that carried the whole of opus 8 into the modern repertoire when Vivaldi's instrumental music was rediscovered.