Leonardo Garcia Alarcon presents and contrasts two monumental works: a Messa Concertata by the choirmaster of the Basilica of San Petronio in Bologna and the famous Dixit Dominus composed by George Frideric Handel in Rome in 1707. A fascinating comparison between a first recording of a forgotten masterpiece and a new interpretation of one of the most brilliant works by the young Handel, dazzled as he was by his discovery of the Italian Baroque.

The sumptuous music of Giovanni Paolo Colonna is brought to life in this concert to honour Bologna's patron saint at the Chapel of St Petronio Basilica - the very place in which this great musician was organist and chapel master in the mid-17th century. The works in this programme are rarely heard due to their grandiose proportions and virtuoso demands in performance. They include the colossal Dixit Dominus for two choirs, trumpet fanfare and strings, as well as the dazzling Beatus vir, possibly the earliest ever example of a concerto grosso.

Harmonies of Devotion is both an exploration of the Italian motet repertory of the seventeenth and early eighteenth centuries and a celebration of the devotion to this sacred repertory displayed by English antiquarian collectors of the eighteenth century. Among the works recorded here for the first time are Giovanni Legrenzi's six-voice masterpiece Intret in conspectu tuo, which survives thanks to a copy made in London by Handel, a five-voice Crucifixus by Legrenzi's pupil Antonio Lotti, sent to London's newly formed Academy of Ancient Music, a grand Marian motet written for the Academy by Agostino Steffani, and music by Steffani's teacher Ercole Bernabei, again collected by members of London's antiquarian music clubs. The recording reveals lines of influence between teachers and pupils, and traces the lineage of the dramatic seconda prattica motet back to it's principal source and pioneer: Monteverdi.