Classical Music

Classical Music

The turn of the 17th century represents not only the golden age of the Venetian Republic, but one of the most variegated moments in the history of Western art music. The innovations of the Venetian School, influential far beyond the confines of it's native lagoon, represent the culmination of a stylistic evolution in a period of aesthetic transition from the high Renaissance to the early Baroque. The instrumental music of "La Serenissima" is celebrated not only for the enormous historical, cultural, and artistic inheritance that it represents, but, quite simply, for it's sheer beauty. La Pifarescha incorporates a fascinating and diverse selection of instruments. Shawms, sackbuts, cornetts, trumpets, bagpipes, dulcians, flutes, fiddles, lutes, viols, percussion, and many others, join together to alternate the sounds of "alta" with the "bassa cappella", offering a highly variable sonority unique to this group. Thus, La Pifarescha traces the evolution from the alta cappella to the noble consort of cornetts and sackbuts, which appeared on the scene during the renaissance and flourished in the early baroque, often expanding it's ranks to include keyboards, strings, and voices.

Classical Music

Among the many students in search of a good musical education, a certain Gaetano Veneziano moved to Naples, then among the hotbeds of musical life in 17th c. Europe, from his native Apulia at age ten to study in one it's cities four music conservatoires. In addition to a Miserere for 4 voices and a Sinfonia Quarta by his contemporary A. Scarlatti, this Pan Classics release presents three late 17th c. 'In Officio Defunctorum' (part of the normal repertoire of every church and performed every time a nobleman died), the texts being set to music by this imaginative, late-Renaissance Italian composer.

Carlo Lenzi, born in 1735 near Bergamo, was educated in Naples, famous for its four conservatories. He worked for 40 years as maestro di cappella at the Basilica of Santa Maria Maggiore in Bergamo. His permanent residence in that town was both a blessing and a curse to the composer: on teh one hand he occupied a prestigious position, which was safe and stable, but on the other hand he was limited to a local audience, so that his works were largely confined to Bergamo, cut off from the most important international communication channels. We are presented with the opportunity to rediscover this treasure today: an extensive vocal and instrumental oeuvre, largely comparable with Mozart and Haydn's works. Out of Lenzi's entire compositional output, his 34 Lamentations for the Holy Week particularly stand out. For this recording, the first lamentation for Good Friday in 1777 and the second lamentation for Maundy Thursday in 1780 were chosen. Both share a modern style, a pathetic-sentimental expresion, as well as brilliant and intricately composed vocal parts. They manifest a personal inclination towards the galant style, which is characterized by a strong sense for the word and its setting. Mozart composed the motet Exsultate, jubilate KV 165 in Milan in 1773 for the soprano Venanzio Rauzzini. This motet is one of the Mozart's most remarkable spiritual works. Its outstanding design has the same characteristics as the compositions of Lenzi: a brilliant euphoria that would develop into a stylistic hallmark of Mozart's works for Milan and for Salzburg.

Camilla de Rossi is one of the most mysterious figures in music history. She was one of only a handful of women who composed music in Austria and Northern Italy during the period between 1670 and 1725. No biographical information remains on de Rossi, however she has the most surviving works amongst her female contemporaries. One of the few known facts about her is that she was of Roman descent, as she signed all of her compositions “Romana” which means a woman of Roman descent. Sant’Alessio, featured on this recording, was one of four oratorios that de Rossi composed under commission by Emperor Joseph I of Austria.

Johann Sebastian Bach's chamber music was in constant transition. His few surviving trio sonatas, for the traditional combination of two melody instruments and continuo, likely date from his years in Weimar and Kothen. Bach revisited some of these works in Leipzig, reworking them for concerts at Zimmerman's coffee house into sonatas for a melody instrument with harpsichord obbligato. Unfortunately, few of these manuscripts survive, leaving us with only later arrangements as rough clues to their original form and instrumentation. Prominent Bach scholars agree that Bach, just as Handel and Telemann, must have made a major contribution to the main genre of 18th century chamber music. In view of this evaluation, there is a particularly unfortunate gap in the catalogue of the Thomaskantor's works. Our program was conceived as an approximation of some of these lost trio sonatas.

Classical Music

Classical Music

Jos� de Nebra, born in 1702 to a family of musicians from Aragon, already made his career in Madrid as a young man: at the age of 17 he took over the position of organist from Tom�s de Victoria and also celebrated great success at the opera. In 1736 he was appointed organist and later vice kapellmeister of the Royal Chapel. From this time on, his creative focus was on sacred music and he created more than 170 sacred compositions. After the coronation of Fernando VI and his wife B�rbara de Braganza, the musical work at the court experienced a great revival: the queen brought the famous musicians Scarlatti and Farinelli to the Spanish court and the Royal Chapel also experienced a great boom. Nebra's Requiem, first performed at the funeral of Queen Dona B�rbara de Braganza on 29 August 1758, clearly stands out from his sacred works: written for two choirs, string orchestra and two flutes, it combines techniques of the great vocal polyphony of the Renaissance with the modern compositional style influenced by Italy. Until well into the 19th century, Nebra's Requiem remained in the repertoire of the royal orchestra as the preferred work for royal funerals, and the magnificent work is now available here as world first recording.

Classical Music

Geminiano Giacomelli (1692-1740), like many other composers of his time, enjoyed wide popularity during his lifetime thanks to his operatic endeavours and was later forgotten, a victim of the rapid changes in vocal taste and style. Giacomelli’s theatrical writing is full of wit, invention and melodic flair, and there is, at least, an honest attempt in the portrayal of the characters’ emotions. The writing is very much that of his time, focusing on the practice of full belcanto in all his glory. Our selection, encompassing the period from 1729 to 1735, tries to display not only Giacomelli’s “lively imagination”, but also the wide spectrum of affetti from which the opera seria of the time usually profited. In fact, the eleven arias used here (accompanied by some sinfonias) depict a various number of feelings and situations, as well as several different styles: a colourful, varied series of arias ranging from pathetic to furious, from sentimental to proud, from optimistic to dramatic.

Ghiselin Danckerts (c 1510 -1567) was a Dutch composer, singer, and music theorist of the Renaissance. He was principally active in Rome, in the service of the Papal Chapel. Nothing is known of his early life. Like many of his contemporaries from the Low Countries, he may have received his early training in his homeland, going to Italy as a young adult. He was admitted as a singer at the Papal Chapel in March 1538, a position he retained, seemingly without break, until 1565. In August 1565 he was forced to retire from the papal chapel as part of a reorganization and reduction in size which followed from the reforms of the Council of Trent. A few works of Danckerts have survived, but no complete publications - one motet, an eight-voice setting of Laetamini in domino, survives in a manuscript; other surviving works include several madrigals and puzzle canons. The here recorded Missa de Beata Vergine has recently come to light. It is a polyphonic mass with improvised elements, as was customary for most of the Gregorian repertoire at this time in Rome. The plain chant (i.e. The Gregorian melody) was laid in the lowest voice and the other parts would have sung the same melody on top of that, at a consonant interval. In this way, the result was a pyramidal structure where the sopranos and tenors could freely improvise ascending and descending runs.

Classical Music