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Rossaro: L'opera da camera vocale e strumentale
Marini: Per le musiche di camera concerti, Op. 7
Petrali: Complete Organ Works
Monteverdi: Scherzi musicali, Venezia 1607
Banchieri: Gemelli armonico & Metamorfosi musicale
Pasquini: Organ Works
Vivaldi: Concerti For 2 Violins / Cicillini, Venturini
The roles of the two violins can greatly differ. Sometimes they play in parallel thirds, elsewhere they are involved in a contrapuntal texture with imitation. There are also episodes in which the second violin accompanies the first or vice versa. Lastly they can develop a dialogue which can take the character of cooperation or rather confrontation. The roles of the violins can change within a single concerto or even movement. That is part of the attraction of these concertos for both performers and listeners.
The programme starts with the Concerto in D (RV 513). It is one of the most virtuosic pieces and the only one which was printed - apart from the op. 3 concertos. The edition dates from 1736 but the concerto was probably written about ten years earlier. Particularly remarkable is the written-out cadenza for both violins in the last movement which includes various modulations.
The Concertos in B flat (RV 526) and in A (RV 520) belong to a collection of twelve which Vivaldi offered to the Habsburg emperor Charles VI. Unfortunately the parts of the first solo violin are missing. These have been reconstructed by Fabrizio Ammetto. The features of the violin parts in the double concertos mentioned above are helpful in the process of reconstruction. This has resulted in two beautiful concertos with a nice interplay of the two solo violins.
The Concerto in B flat (RV 764) is a reworking of a concerto for oboe and violin (RV 548). The largo is especially beautiful, with the two violins involved in an engaging dialogue supported by the basso continuo alone. The Concerto in A (RV 521) is a case of literal imitation between the two violins, and is described by Fabrizio Ammetto as "probably the result of an experiment in polychoral composition". He suggests that Vivaldi may have placed the soloists and even the tutti violins in different locations. It is a most intriguing concerto, with demanding solo parts.
The Concerto in B flat (RV 528), another reconstruction, is also known from Bach's transcription for harpsichord (BWV 980). It exists in another version, with one solo part (RV 381). It seems not quite clear which was the original version. In this version for two violins the second plays a subordinate role; in the slow movement it doesn't participate at all. The liner-notes fail to make clear what exactly has been reconstructed here. The disc ends with the Concerto in F (RV 765) which also exists in a version with violin and organ as solo instruments (RV 767). The technical demands of the soloists are limited here.
This disc is very interesting in regard to the repertoire. No fewer than three concertos (RV 528, 764 and 765) are recorded here for the first time. The fact that some concertos needed to be reconstructed makes this disc even more valuable as such pieces are obviously not often played. Fortunately the interpreters are fully up to the job; their playing is technically sound and they grasp the character of the various concertos well.
Often this kind of music is played with one instrument per part. That is not the case here: the tutti comprises four violins, two violas and two cellos; one of the latter also participates in the basso continuo. The result is a more robust sound and a larger contrast between soli and tutti. It is impossible to say which number of players is closer to the historical truth. It seems that it could vary from one place to another or from one occasion to another. I would have liked a more intimate acoustic, but that in no way diminishes my appreciation for this disc.
-- Johan van Veen, MusicWeb International
Pergolesi: La Serva Padrona / Dallara, Zanello, Govi, Regia
The work is simplicity itself. Its two acts last barely forty-five minutes and contain five arias, two duets, a finale, and lots of secco recitative. No single number lasts much longer than four minutes, and several of the recitatives are bigger than the arias. The plot is rudimentary: Serpina the maid is so pushy that her bachelor employer, Uberto, decides to get married simply to get her under the control of the household’s new mistress. Serpina, seeing her chance, decides that she will marry Uberto herself, and after she arranges her own trumped up wedding to a stranger Uberto realizes that he loves her and all ends as planned.
Pergolesi’s music seems to have been designed to show off in the most schematic way all that was most appealing in the Italian school. The scoring is paired down to strings and continuo; the accompaniments are simple, the characters (only two of them) come from the middle and working classes, the action moves swiftly, and best of all, the tunes are pure vocal gold. Consider, for example, the sweetly lyrical aria, “A Serpina penserete”. Music historians, scholars, and theoreticians have never been able to wrap their brains around a style dependent on quality of melody as its primary constituent–it really is unanalyzable–and the result has always been a tendency to disparage Italian music as compared to the German or French schools, especially when those doing the analyzing happen to be German or French. Audiences, of course, have no such difficulties, hence the Querelle des bouffons and other, similar controversies throughout history.
This performance, fortunately, is quite a good one. As Uberto baritone Michele Govi sings with firm tone and he acts well with the voice; only a weakness in his lower register prevents him from being ideal. Federica Zanello’s soprano sounds a bit heavy, dare I say “matronly?” for the waspish Serpina, but she uses what she has intelligently and she is never unpleasant to listen to. The Ensemble Regia Accademia, a pick-up group drawn from various northern Italian orchestras, plays well under the direction of Marco Dallara, and the engineering sounds warm and well-balanced. As I said at the start, it’s very odd that there are so few choices available for this work, but this one will do nicely.
-- David Hurwitz, ClassicsToday.com
Scintillate Amicae Stellae / Cappella Artemisia
The feast of the Nativity held a special place in the hearts and lives of Italian nuns. In a letter to archbishop Federigo Borromeo, a Milanesenun thanked him for his gift of a lute which “has cheered all of the nuns with me, [...] and thus on the night of Holy Christmaswe went to play Matins to all the nuns, singing Gloria in excelsis [...]”. This recording presents works composed by and for these women that might have been heard or performed at Christmastime, andthey call for a great variety of forces ranging from solo voices to double choirs of both singers and instruments. The nun composers represented include the Ursulines Maria Xaveria Perucona and Isabella Leonarda, author of 20 collectionsof vocal and instrumental music; Chiara Margarita Cozzolani and her conventual sister Rosa Giacinta Badalla from the renownedMilanese convent of Santa Radegonda; and Caterina Assandra, composer and dedicatee of various collections. The CD also featuresworks by eminent male composers (Massenzio, Rota, Reina, Speer et al.) and dedicated to these remarkable cloistered musicians.
Bossi: Musica da camera
L'Organo in Europa fra Rinascimento e Barocco
Leo: Serenate e Cantate
Respighi: Variazioni per Violoncello e Pianoforte - Prelude
Canti Gregoriani: Visitatio Sepulchri
CANTI GREGORIANI NICOLAUS
Piatti: Capricci, Op. 22 & Op. 25 per Violoncello solo - Dal
Frescobaldi: Le Canzoni da Sonare
Quagliati: Toccata, Ricercari e Canzoni
Monteverdi: Lamento d'Arianna - Scherzi musicali cioe arie e
Banchieri: Il Virtuoso
Cortellini: Il terzo libro de' madrigali a 5 voci
Vivaldi: Le 4 Stagioni - Guarnieri: Stagioni
Scarlatti: Opera omnia per tastiera, Vol. 2
Sonate e Concerti per violino - Archicembalo Ensemble
Vivaldi: The Paris Concertos / Sardelli, Modo Antiquo
The German patrician von Uffenbach, during a visit to Venice for the carnival of 1715, at long last managed to meet with Vivaldi and order from him “10 concerti grossi”. Three days later, the composer reappeared with all of the requested music, assuring his patron that it had been expressly composed for him. Vivaldi was unquestionably a very quick composer, but he was also a barefaced and extremely capable promoter of his own talents. The collection of twelve concertos for strings, now preserved in Paris, also has all the earmarks of having been a rapidly and cleverly assembled series of previously composed works, with very little new music added. This same modus operandi would mark the genesis of op. 10 and many other collections by Vivaldi. But Vivaldi is an excellent composer, and like a great actor, he succeeds in taking on the appearance of a character by merely donning a hat or imitating a gesture. Thus he manages to outline with a few brushstrokes all of the force of a French entree in the opening of Concerto n. 5, or to fall suddenly into the most moving melancholy when his unusual Ciaccona modulates into the minor key. Even the last movement of Concerto n. 2, despite appearances, is a rare example of a menuet en rondeau camouflaged as an Italian allegro. The beginning of Concerto n. 1, although belonging to the older works, must have been chosen by Vivaldi to open the collection because it resembles a chaconne in binary meter. These, then, are the distinctive elements, obvious and yet quite effective, which render the idea of a well recognizable taste or style—the same style which informed the “Domine Fili” from the Gloria RV 589, the aria “Tornar voglio” from Arsilda, and the final chorus of Il Giustino. Federico Maria Sardelli conducts the famous baroque ensemble Modo Antiquo, in this amazing historical recording.
