This recording combines three of the most significant musicians belonging to the generation of the empfindsame or "sentimental" style. As a reaction to the late baroque of J.S. Bach and Handel, they systematically explored contrast and extreme juxtapositions in their compositions. This avant-garde style remained in fashion for only a short period, but anticipated many pre-eminent aspects of early romanticism. In this recording a harpsichord concerto by W.F. Bach (J.S. Bach's eldest son) is combined with two concertos by Bohemian composer G. Benda. They perfectly illustrate the empfindsame style, quickly oscillating between excitement and melancholy, furious frenzy and serene calm. The programme concludes with major solo harpsichord pieces by C.P.E. Bach and a beautiful Adagio and Fugue for orchestra by W.F. Bach - showcasing the composer's ability in the stile antico.

An ensemble selected from the excellent Capelle of Friedrich August I in Dresden, the Cammer-Musique and its leader, the phenomenal oboist Johann Christian Richter, inspired some of the leading German composers and Italian guests at the court around 1720 to write sonatas in which oboes and bassoon are challenged with extremely expressive and virtuosic parts. This was the time and place in which the largest amount of impressive music with oboe and bassoon as soloists in history was written. German composers such as Heinichen, Zelenka (to be heard by Zefiro on ARCANA A 394), Fasch and Quantz wrote these pieces in the Italian style, with the typical alternation between singing adagios and brilliant allegros. Telemann composed a sonata with ornamentation and affects inspired by the French style. Lotti, who resided in Dresden between 1717 and 1719, also noticed the outstanding skills of the court’s wind players and wrote his only solo pieces for these instruments there. Vivaldi met Richter during the latter’s visit to Venice in 1716, when he accompanied the Elector to the city, and he too dedicated some remarkable oboe and bassoon solos to the German musician.

Throughout it's Golden Age, England cultivated the masque, an elite entertainment featuring dialogue, song, and dance. As part of these spectacles, courtiers-and at times even the queen herself-often graced the dance floor. But it was hired professionals who provided the musical heart of these productions. Lutenists in particular were especially adept at creating music for any occasion. The dances, variations on popular songs, and fantasias they composed are full of versatility and virtuosity. This recording features lute works by the foremost composers of the Elizabethan-Jacobean era, with music by Dowland, Holborne, Bacheler, Ferrabosco, and other contemporaries who participated in The Queenes Maskes. For many years Elisa La Marca has been much sought after by leading specialist ensembles (Il Giardino Armonico, Il Pomo d'Oro, Les Musiciens du Prince, Zefiro etc.), with which she appears in prestigious locations, the mostly recent being the Teatro alla Scala in Milan. Here she presents her first solo album, devoted to one of her favourite repertoires.

A great composer and his angelic singer: a history of crossed destinies. Marc'Antonio Orrigoni, one of the most famous castratos of his generation, rediscovered through an imaginary songbook collecting the arias composed for him by Alessandro Stradella. With Rome, Genoa, Modena, splendid opera theaters and magnificent palaces that form a gilded, glittering background. An incredible journey that will thrill you while rediscovering the hidden pages of the Golden Age of the Italian Seicento.

With the release of The Queen's Favourites in 2021, La Petite Ecurie provided listeners insight into the original repertoire for the Oboe Band, which was very much in vogue at the time of Queen Anne (c. 1700). The debut album received five Diapasons in the renowned French magazine and numerous positive reviews. The International Double Reed Society described their "beautiful tone, precise intonation, rhythmic vigor, and wonderful sense of style." The inspiration for the latest album by La Petite Ecurie, No Strings Attached, originates from the preface of Johann Christian Schieferdecker's thirteen Musikalische Concerte, in which he expressed that: "They were composed with such care that, in the absence of the necessary people, they could also be performed with only 4 voices, namely 3 Hautbois and 1 Bassoon". With this sentence, Schieferdecker encapsulates the fundamental idea that strings are sometimes redundant! No Strings Attached presents music by composers from Germany (Schieferdecker & Keiser), France (Boismortier & Dornel), Italy (Vivaldi) and England (Handel & Purcell), whose compositions showcase the endless virtuosic capabilities of the Oboe Band.

After the success of the complete works for lute by J. S. Bach, crowned by the recognition of international critics (Diapason d'Or, Choc de Classica, Excepcional Scherzo, Record Geijutsu, Eccezionale di Musica, Joker Absolu Crescendo), Evangelina offers a double album dedicated to the music of the greatest lutenist of all time: Sylvius Leopold Weiss. In his work, virtuosity and sumptuousness merge against the elegant and ethereal background of the gallant encounters and court dances of the 18th century. A new recording that restores the lute to it's due and ancient glories.

Having dedicated his first two albums for Arcana to Johann Sebastian Bach (Little Books, A480) and Georg Friedrich Handel (Winged Hands, A499), Francesco Corti turns to Domenico Scarlatti, the third great keyboardist of the 1685 generation. For this recording, he selected a group of sonatas copied in the years 1752 and 1753, strictly organised in pairs. Concentrating on works from the same period, it showcases the composer's extraordinary ability to stretch the boundaries of the sonata form and to extensively elaborate his thematic material. Instrumental virtuosity and an experimental approach to the harpsichord sound go hand in hand with an astonishing formal freedom, combined with a playful sense of structure and expectation. Corti has chosen to perform these sonatas on a Humeau harpsichord, a copy of Italian models (courtesy of Bertrand Cuiller), and record them at the Royaumont Abbey.

25 years of La Cetra Basel! To celebrate this anniversary, La Cetra and Arcana are releasing the "greatest musical masterpiece of all time", as the work was called in the 19th century: Bach's Mass in B minor. "It is a dream come true to have recorded this work for La Cetra's 25th jubilee - the best birthday present ever!" says maestro Andrea Marcon. Under his direction, La Cetra Basel has made a name for itself in recent years with acclaimed interpretations of J. S. Bach's most important sacred works. Featuring top-flight soloists, this recording presents Andrea Marcon's particular vision for this Mass, notable for the division of voices between "concertists" and "ripienists". The sonority and character of each movement emerge from the skilfully crafted balance between solos and tuttis, creating a three-dimensional sound reminiscent of a three-manual organ. The result is a unique tonality, full of fresh nuances and colours, and no doubt very close to what Bach had imagined.

This first joint project by the Akademie fur Alte Musik Berlin and the Basel-based vocal ensemble Voces Suaves is dedicated to the musical milieu into which Johann Sebastian Bach was born, and especially to those composers who had a demonstrable influence on the work of the man who would later become Thomaskantor in Leipzig. In addition to pieces from the Altbachisches Archiv (Archive of the Older Bachs), the album features sacred concertos and early cantatas by Bach's predecessors and superiors from Arnstadt, Muhlhausen, Weimar and Leipzig, and with them impressive proof of how highly developed the musical tradition of Central Germany then was. Although many of the composers are completely unknown to us today, their works, some of which are recorded here for the first time, provide a fascinating insight into the musical language of late seventeenth-century Germany with it's inspiring wealth of colours and forms.

Just as the worthy and skilled painter imitates all things created in nature by varying the colours, in the same way you can imitate the expression made by the human voice on a wind and stringed instrument. This concept, which was explained by Silvestro Ganassi in his Opera intitulata La Fontegara already in 1535, has inspired Concerto Scirocco to seek�the maximum expression when interpreting the instrumental music of the 16th and 17th centuries. Hand in hand with the development of the instrumental repertoire, rhetoric became the link between instrument and voice, between imitation and reality. Where words were lacking, composers and instrumentalists used rhetoric to delight listeners just as singers did.� In�this, it's�fifth, recording, Concerto Scirocco focuses on an early baroque anthology of pieces, "painting in notes" a number of musical portraits full of contrasts:�the pulsating rhythm of the battle in the�Symphonia "A�gran�battaglia",�the�beguiling�mermaids in Marco Uccellini's�Aria sopra�"Questa bella Sirena",�or the operatic tension in the�Sonata a�tre�by Francesco Cavalli.

Born in Brussels in 2020, The WIG Society (TWS) has rapidly grown into one of the most exciting musical ensembles on the European Early Music scene. As a rising ensemble within the EEEmerging+ programme, TWS has developed an original approach to the chamber music of the galant and classical period. Their playing highlights the lavish, extravagant, and witty elements of a repertoire principally designed to entertain an aristocratic society on the decline. They re-imagine rococo ballrooms and salons as contemporary dance floors, Haydn as the Beyoncé of the 1770s. Their sound is rich and nuanced in depth thanks to the employment of both the harpsichord and the double-bass, instead of the traditional cello. Alongside works by celebrated composers, TWS proposes some world premiere recordings of neglected composers from the Mannheim School and beyond.

Aufschnaiter: Dulcis fidium harmonia, Op. 4

Bertali: Prothimia suavissima, Book 2

Mozart: Works for Violin & Fortepiano

El Cortesano is the title of a book published in Valencia in 1561 by Luys Milan, who was clearly inspired by Castiglione's work, which defined the Italian model of the refined "courtier" and expert musician that was gradually going to impose itself in all of Europe. Aesthetically, this title is essentially linked to vihuela music - as soloist or accompanying the voice. The vihuela is a somewhat mysterious Iberian instrument that, in Spain and Portugal, took the place of the lute, differing from the latter with its flat shape and slight inward curve at the waist. Today, El Cortesano is the concept made up by the performers of the present release, representing an attempt to reveal the rich, varied repertoire of the Iberian Peninsula during the Renaissance. In no way tired down to a set formation, El Cortesano's mission is to become a flexible ensemble, with the fields of research determining the group's size, and spirit prevailing over form. This approach obviously lies within the entente of the finest Spanish musicians who, over the past three decades, have successfully carried out a reappraisal of the music composed in the peninsula. This album is Jose Hernandez Pastor's first - or at least the first that is devoted entirely to him, for he has recorded with various ensembles, notably those of Jordi Savall. Still quite young, this student of Andreas Scholl demonstrates surprising maturity in the way in which he intends to conduct his career: no "star system" for him, but rather an approach based on research, reconstruction, poetic expression and the links between text and music. With Ariel Abramovich, a sensitive, subtle Argentine lutenist who shares his ideals, he forms an uncompromising team from whom we may expect a great deal: a new generation of pure, noble artists.