Bellissimo Baroque

“Yesterday I was in the realm of shadows. If you knew how strange it is! (…) You see them roar with laughter… yet you cannot hear a sound.” Writer Maksim Gorky’s comment on the first Russian screenings of the Lumiere brothers’ films shows how the need was immediately felt, in cinema, for sound and a musical element to accompany the moving images. This album traces the soundtrack’s birth and gradual development from a simple comment to a language in its own right through the “voice” of a protagonist that was “within and without,” the piano, for which numerous original scores and transcriptions by renowned composers were written.

VERDI: Luisa Miller

LOLLI: Violin Concertos Nos. 1-9 (Complete)

A bold, colorful production, enhanced by the costumes of Belgian fashion designer Kaat Tilley. The opera attracted the interest of the Dutch Ministry of Culture, which has sponsored it. Paolo Arrivabeni conducts the orchestra and chorus of the Opera Royal de Wallonie, Liege, in this performance of Verdi's opera from March 2009. The featured performers include Cinzia Forte, Saimir Pirgu, Giovanni Meoni and Federica Carnevale. Directed by Matteo Ricchetti, Stefano Mazzonis Di Pralafera. Starring Federica Carnevale, Cinzia Forte, Giovanni Meoni. Language: Italian (Dolby Digital 2.0 Surround) Subtitles: English, French, Italian

Giuseppe Tartini (1692 - 1770) had a considerable number of pupils, forming a veritable violin school, the most famous in 18th-century Europe. It was a largely international one and won him the name of “Master of the Nations”.

PONZI, Flavio: Rossini on Rossini's Pleyel

TARTINI, G.: Violin Concertos, Vol. 8 (L'Arte dell'Arco) -

Chiara Soave and Cecilia Baccolo’s Schubert interpretations have always been welcomed enthusiastically by critics and audiences. In 2010, the Duo was invited to perform a programme entirely dedicated to the great Austrian composer at the Concertgebouw Hall in Amsterdam, the only Italian piano duo to be featured in that renowned hall.

LEONCAVALLO: Nuit de mai (La)

Starring Renata Scotto. Renata Scotto, one of the greatest and most famous sopranos of the post-war period, is here recorded in her full artistic maturity and, through this vast and varied program, demonstrates her solid technique and absolutely extraordinary musicality. The performance of this recital ended an eleven-year absence of Scotto from the Japanese stage � a return she clearly relishes as she dedicates the rare musical gems in her performance to the Tokyo audience. Together with famous arias from renowned operas she performs some rare and neglected works, notably Edgar (Puccini�s first opera) and Sole e Amore (written before the success of La Boh�me) as well as Respighi�s songs and five unpublished songs by Verdi. The DVD also features a two-minute forward by Renata Scotto (sub � E/G/F/Sp) and a thirteen-minute video featuring the madness scene, Lucia di Lammermoor, Tokyo, 1967 Format: NTSC Subtitles: Japanese

Verdi: Giovanna d'Arco

During the 18th century in Naples there were a huge number of excellent musicians. As a result, Neapolitan music reveals an exhaustive and surprising gold mine of new discoveries and small masterpieces. None of these sonatas have ever been recorded before. Flautist Renata Cataldi presents these works on an authentic transverse flute. She is joined by the ensemble Partenope Stravagante, cellist Leonardo Massa, and harpsichordist Debora Capitanio. Renata Cataldi studied at the "Licinio Refice" in Frosinone and "San Pietro a Majella" in Naples, and received her Doctor of Musical Arts at the University of Bologna. She regularly concertizes as a soloist, in various chamber ensembles, and in orchestra, devoting herself to the modern, Renaissance, and Baroque transverse flute. With the transverse flute, she dedicates herself to the recovery and enhancement of the eighteenth-century Neapolitan musical heritage. She is also the author of essays and articles published for the State Archives of Rome and the Italian Society of Musicology.

THREE STRING QUARTETS

"World premiere recording! Cesar Franck's first opera – staged for the first time! Known mainly for the few transcendent, harmonically adventurous instrumental works of his later years, Cesar Franck's first opera was composed when he was barely twenty years of age. Orchestrated by composer Luc Van Hove, from the autographic piano score manuscript. Paolo Arrivabeni conducts the Orchester & Chorus of the Opéra Royal de Wallonie. Stage direction by Jaco van Dormael."