The Lied from Jugendstil to Cabaret. The 'Lied', a special literary-musical form probably originating in the Carolingian Kirchenlieder and widely spread in Germany speaking countries, had its moment to glory in the XIX century. It is in this period, in fact, that composers such as Schubert, Schumann, Franz, Brahms, Wolf, Reger, Pfitzner and Strauss turned this essentially popular genre-'song' being the English translation for 'Lied' - into something exquisitely artistic. But for all the importance and meaningfulness of the Lieder production in the XIX century, sings of decline were already evident at the beginning of the XX, due probably to the development of new compositional techniques and to the composers' new approach to poetry. With some exceptions: a number of musicians who lived in Vienna and Berlin and great contributed to the liveliness and complexity of the artistic climate of these cites, chose the Lied as one of their expressive means, thus giving it new life and impulse.

Bernardo Pasquini was born at Massa in Val di Nievole, Grand Duchy of Tuscany. He was a pupil of Mariotto Bocciantini in Uzzano. Around 1650 he moved to Ferrara with his uncle Giovanni Pasquini. In 1654-55 he was organist of Accademia della Morte, then later he moved to Rome where he became organist of Santa Maria in Vallicella. As a composer and keyboardist, he collaborated on the performances patronized by the most famous patrons in Rome, including cardinals Chigi, Pamphilj, Ottoboni, and Queen Christina of Sweden. Together with Arcangelo Corelli and Alessandro Scarlatti, in 1706 Pasquini became a member of the Academy of Arcadia. He composed numerous operas, and around sixty cantatas. This new release presents Organ works by Pasquini. Particularly notable is the Toccata con lo Scherzo del Cucco, written in florid style in 1702.

The Alea Ensemble plays works by Antonio Bartolomeo Bruni on this new release. The ensemble expresses the youth, excitement and fright that Bruni was experiencing while composing these pieces. In the spring of 1780, Bruni had recently arrived in France and quickly rose to fame for his skills on the violin. These compositions capture his emotions and experiences while he rode out his youth and acclaim.

Italian organist and composer Marco Enrico Bossi (1861-1925) was born into a family of musicians. His father was organist at Salo Cathedral. He studied at the Liceo Musicale in Bologna and the Milan Conservatory before becoming director of music and organist at Como Cathedral. Later, he became the professor of organ and harmony at Naples Conservatory. He wrote more than 150 works for various genres, most of which remain largely unknown, except for his organ works. Organist Marco Ruggeri performs the works on the present release on an illustrious Lingiardi organ which resides in the Reggio Emilia province.

The orchestra-model organ was made by Luigi Lingiardi, the great organ builder, in the 1850's. He wanted to build an organ based on the 17th-18th century Lombardy School and further perfect it's orchestra imitation capabilities. The orchestra, has a variety of timbres, combination of possibilities and crescendo-diminuendo capabilities.

The organ and other keyboard instruments were always considered harmonic support in the Baroque period. They constituted a constant presence in the accompaniment of the voice or other soloistic instruments and a fundamental part of larger groups as well. Nevertheless, the keyboard instrument was able to raise itself to a soloistic role thanks to the practice of transcription and, in certain cases, take over all of the orchestral parts. There were numerous keyboardists who transcribed orchestral music with great ability, sometimes creating real masterpieces for their instrument. This permitted them to perform well-known pieces without having to turn to other instrumentalists. Bach, for example, transcribed numerous concertos using, naturally, a large instrument equipped with pedal keyboard.+ The examples on this release are no less brilliant, though they don’t call for a pedal part. This characteristic makes them suitable for harpsichord performance, which is analogously what happens with concertos transcribed by the Englishwoman Anne Dawson. Of strong musicological interest on this release is the juxtaposition of two transcriptions of the same piece, thus allowing for a full appreciation of notable stylistic differences.

Ensemble L'Aura Soave Cremona plays repertoire from the 15th century on this new release from MVC. This music was ahead of it's time as a good part of the repertoire for two lutes in the next century would still call for one lute to play a fast, agile line and the other to support it harmonically through the use of chords. Girolamo Kapsberger's Gagliarda and Bergamasca are ahead of their time and great examples of these lyrical, agile pieces.

The long life of Don Pietro Gnocchi remains largely a mystery. We know the precise periods during which he worked at the Cathedral in Brescia, first as Maestro di Cappella, from 16th June 1723, and then as organist, from 10th April 1762 until his death; but apart from this, biographers seem to have simply passed back and forth what little information they possessed without reference to it's source. As such, may aspects of his musical life are still to be determined: his early musical education in Alfianello and Bresica, the subsequent move to Venice and the Basilica of St. Marks, pupil of a Maestro di Cappella, and the exhausting travelling to the courts of Europe where he was very highly acclaimed, together with his "trusty companion, excellent player upon the violin." It is, then, the music that reveals the man, and Gnocchi has left us with a considerable musical output, music for the most part intended for the church, as one would expect of a capable musician, careful of providing the Cappella with the compositions required to accompany the various functions. The Archive of the Brescia cathedral in particular overflows with the manuscripts of masses, psalms and antiphonies that allow us to testify to the talent and creative fervor of Gnocchi, a composer consciously tied to a contrapuntal style a cappella, but one who nevertheless did not disdain from making frequent musical forays of a less austere manner with the help of instruments and solo voices. The present release features his Sonate a tre, performed by the capable musicians of Brixia Musicalis.

Johann Sebastian Bach was known by the contemporaries as a great expert in the art of organ building, and above all, as an incomparable virtuoso to the instrument. There are testimonies of his mastery and precision, his improvisational capacity, and there are also some acts of tests he performed. His concerts alternated various types of compositions and, knowing the vastness of musical culture of the Supreme Master, it is easy to imagine how he could use it to improvise in all styles of the time. Having at our disposal for this release an organ the embraces a geographical tradition-in particular those Italian and German-organist Davide Pozzi wanted to recreate a hypothetical concert performed by Bach in the Italian style. The Italian harpsichordist, fortepianist, organist and conductor, Davide Pozzi, got the diploma with full marks of harpsichord, fortepiano and clavichord, and organ and organ composition at the Conservatorio G. Verdi in Milan. At the same conservatoire he got a first-class degree in organ. Davide Pozzi held the organ post at the ancient Basilica di S. Vittore al Corpo in Milan for 13 years. Already a harpsichord teacher at the Cesena Conservatory, he is currently Professor of Theory, Rhythmic and musical perception, Basso continuo and harpsichord practice at the Conservatorio G. Verdi di Como.

Massimiliano Sanca writes: “The pieces proposed in this album are the result of studies and in-depth research of masterpieces from the vast organ literature written in Germany in the XVII and XVIII century. The intonation studied and adopted on this particular organ, inspired by the great Gottfried Silbermann and the choice of temperament, which was most probably adopted on various organs of the time, as for example suggests to us the careful analysis of the counterpoint and the harmonies used in the keyboard compositions by the great Johann Sebastian Bach, aroused that interest and enthusiasm that led me with determination to the realization of this recording project that, certainly, does not end with this recording. The chosen registers, in the compositions performed here, make it pleasant to listen to even in the harmonic passages defined as “harder”, deriving from the unequal temperament and also offer a complete sound overview of the details of the pitch of the pipes which, according to the nature and the register language, make the musical discourse even more clear and understandable. Finally, the timbre variety of this instrument creates a unicum of emotions and sonorous colors which, as if by magic, plunges us into the past.”

Nicolò Paganini (Genoa, 1782 - Nice, 1840) is universally renowned as the greatest violin virtuoso of all times and as a huge innovator of violin technique. But the sources reveal that Paganini, besides being an extraordinary and eccentric virtuoso violinist, able to thrill the first half of the 19th century public in Italy and in the rest of Europe, was also a very skilled guitarist, even though his performances with this instrument happened only in private occasions; in fact, we don’t have any testimony of public guitar executions.

Paganini himself, in his autobiography tells about his relationship with plucked instruments, a relationship that started at a very young age. We are around the year 1795-1796 when Paganini started being interested in the guitar, so from that moment on, until the year 1804, we would compose the main corpus of his guitar works, consisting in 37 sonatas for guitars (M.S. 84) and the 5 sonatinas (M.S. 85) that are the object of the present recording in which the Italian guitarist Massimiliano Filippini plays a wonderful guitar made by Gaetano Guadagnini in Turin in 1823.

Paganini wrote these words to his friend Luigi Guglielmo Germi, on January 7th, 1824: “I’m writing to you because a lady is looking for a beautiful, but most importantly, fine guitar. If she finds it here, let me know, otherwise, ask my brother, meaning to demand him to inquire from my copyist where or in which village of Piemonte lives that fellow whose name I don’t recall, but who is an excellent artist for guitars, and commission him a good instrument, well refined and well-sounding. Please take care of this.” Therefore, Paganini knew about a great Piedmontese artisan, an “excellent artist for the guitar”; he perhaps heard about the fantastic acoustic results of the new model of guitar made by the young Gaetano Guadagnini? We don’t know, but this is a suggestive hypothesis that makes even more coherent his choice of using a Guadagnini guitar of the year 1823 to record the Paganini Sonatas for guitar.

Born in Grottkau, a town close to Wroclaw in Lower Silesia (modern day Poland), Sylvius Leopold Weiss (1687-1750) is for the lute what Johann Sebastian Bach represents for harpsichord and organ. Since 1706, in his hometown, he served Count of Palatinate Charles Philippe, brother of Prince Johann Wilhelm, Elector Palatine, patron of the arts and dedicatee of Arcangelo Corelli’s Concerti Grossi, Op VI.

Starting in 1718, he settled permanently in Dresden, refusing the salary offered by the Viennese Court –which was almost twice as much as he was earning in Dresden – and dedicated his efforts to composing more than 600 lute pieces, either solo or with other instruments. In Dresden, he took part in the musical life in court and met numerous musicians; he was particularly friendly with Wilhelm Friedemann Bach, Johann Sebastian’s son and organist at Saint Sophia’s Church. In 1739, the two friends travelled to Leipzig where they were hosted by Johann Sebastian for four weeks. We don’t know for sure for the music played by Bach and Weiss during their meeting, but it seems legitimate to think that they played their music on their instruments composing, arringing or improvising together. This programme is meant to witness this precise type of practise, and in some manner aims at recreating the musical atmosphere of these two musicians’ meeting, during which, as reported by Johann Friedrich Reichardt in the Berlinische Musikalische Zeitung,"being aware of the difficulty in performing controlled and elegant phrases on the lute, eyewitnesses ensure that the great lutenist from Dresden, together with the great organist and harpsichordist Bach improvised many fugues and fantasies together".

Cremona 1679 – Antonio Stradivari was in his thirties and, despite his young age, was undoubtedly a renowned maker among the excellent Cremonese craftsmen. He lived with his first wife Francesca Ferraboschi in strada Magistra, in the parish of Sant’Agata. The following year he took an important step as confirmation of his success and wealth: he bought a house with workshop opposite the church of San Domenico, in the quarter that was the heart of the creative activity of the city’s violin makers. Made in the same year, the Hellier violin and the Sabionari guitar reveal Stradivari’s great technical skills and artistic maturity. The Hellier, a violin of large size and vigorous style, was named after its first, lucky owner, a rich gentleman of British origin who presumedly bought the violin directly from Stradivari. The decoration of the ribs and scroll, made with the technique of inlay filled with mastic of wood paste and glue, is characterized by a phytomorphic design of flowers and buds with animals. The elegant ornamentation on the top and back plates consists of a double inlayed purfling enclosing small ivory or bone lozenges and roundels fixed with mastic of wood and glue.

The Sabionari is one of the five Baroque guitars made by Antonio Stradivari that have survived to date. It was made in 1679 based on the same mould used in 1681 for the Giustiniani guitar and in 1688 for the Hill guitar. According to some sources, the instrument was sold by Stradivari’s descendants to Giovanni Sabionari from Ferrara at the end of the eighteenth century. In the early nineteenth century, it was modified to become a six-string guitar, as it happened to many Baroque guitars, by the maker Giuseppe Marconcini. In 2011, the guitar was restored to its original Baroque configuration with five double strings after the replacement of the parts made by Marconcini.

With this CD begins the publication of the complete Bach's organ works by the Italian organist Massimiliano Sanca. The compositions that have been selected for this first CD are pieces of different character: austere and severe nature works – and works that describe the serenity and peace. The Prelude and Fugue BWV 546, Fantasy and Fugue BWV 537, Prelude and Fugue BWV 549, Chorale BWV 658,“represent”, through the music, suffering, pain and difficulties of humanity in a cosmic sense; on the other hand, the Chorales BWV 676 in the Trio and BWV 676 Manualiter, Chorale BWV 668, Fugue on the Magnificat BWV 733 are works that describe the serenity and peace of God’s kingdom with Mary, his mother, and the angels, as expressed in the Holy Scriptures.

As a result in this recording everything converges, once again with the Bach music, into a profound union between human and divine nature, and in fact between Heaven and Earth. Massimiliano Sanca plays on the beautiful organ made by Ilic Colzani in 2007 for of the Sanctuary of the "Madonna of Mangher" in Vallio Terme (Brescia, Italy).

Among the 555 Scarlatti sonatas, those expressly dedicated to organ performance are in the minority. We are dealing with seven to eight sonatas where the organ is, from time to time, alluded to with specific wording (“Per organ da camera”, or “For chamber organ”), with stop indications or, more generally speaking, with a relatively sober style, as in some fugues, distinguishing it from the usual harpsichord idiom. Thus, this recording is not intended to present a Scarlattian organistic production that is almost nonexistent. The sonatas chosen do not at all belong to that small group of organ pieces. Rather, they are placed among those markedly for the harpsichord both in musical style and considering today’s frequent performances or recordings of them. However, the extraordinary richness of Scarlatti’s writing often lends itself to “alternative” interpretations, so that one can imagine chords, acciaccaturas, scales and melodic figures in a sonorous dimension different from the usual. The principle followed was to accomplish a sort of “instrumentation” at the organ using organistic effects to highlight even more certain expressive traits of Scarlattian writing. For this reason, characteristic sonatas with strong rhythmic-harmonic contrasts and markedly colorful—almost descriptive—effects were chosen. In these cases, adaptation to the organ was easier and more plausible on a strictly musical (though not “philological”) level.