Few musicians were as versatile as the humble Brother Martini, who insisted on being called that way in spite of all the honors rendered to him in Bologna and everywhere. He is celebrated in our time as an extraordinary keeper of books, scores and paintings; in his time, he was quite famous also as an erudite musician, an expert writer of treatises, a pioneering historian, and an authentic “maestro” of music. And as a composer, obviously; but of what? Of everything that pertained to a Kapellmeister and an organist: masses, motets, psalms, hymns, organ sonatas, and so on; and also harpsichord sonatas, concertos, cantatas, duets and profane arias. The Euridice Choir conducted by Pier Paolo Scattolin and the soloists Giacomo Contro, Angela Troilo, and Vincenzo Di Donato are the protagonists of the reconstruction (seen the several gaps found on the original score) of the intermezzo ”Azione Teatrale” of 1726, and of the realization of the “Calls of the street vendors at the Bologna market,” including 13 amongst the countless vocal canons composed by Padre Martini that, once for all is offering to us a lively cross-section of eighteenth-century Bologna in its most daily and popular aspects.

Renewed interest in outstanding Italian organ works of the 19th and 20thc. explains the decision to dedicate recordings to the work of Polibio Fumagalli, a prominent and prolific figure in 19th c. Italy and a link between the old and the new concept of organ construction and composition in Italy. An organ teacher at the Conservatory of Milan (among his students was Marco Enrico Bossi), Fumagalli succeeded in moving from the Italian opera style to the neoclassical, symphonic tendencies of the German and French style. Organist Fabio Re plays the monumental Valenza cathedral Serassi (1852) organ.

The 150th anniversary celebrations of Florence, Capital of the Kingdom of Italy (1865-2015) create an opportunity to know and appreciate the voices of the two precious organs preserved in the basilica of San Lorenzo, and the music composed by musicians active in Florence. The organ built by Fratelli Serassi in 1864, with more than 60 registers and three keyboards, is one of the most impressive and unique of its time. The Renaissance-era organ dates to the mid-15th c. The recording features Florentine works from the Renaissance, Classical and Romantic eras, many of which are world premieres.

After the publication of the complete keyboard works within the tc.580600 box set, with this album Tactus begins the world premiere of the Frescobaldi unpublished manuscripts, whose attribution has finally come to an end after years of work by Constance Frei and Etienne Darbellay, the most accredited musicologist in the studies concerning the great composer from Ferrara, and curator of the most important printed edition ever made of his keyboard works. Ivana Valotti, at the Antegnati 1565 organ in the Palatine Basilica of Santa Barbara in Mantua, performs a variegated anthology of toccatas, canzonas, and ricercars. The music is taken from the Chigi codices, a seventeenth-century collection of vocal scores and keyboard manuscripts collected by the Chigi family, which has in its leading exponents Fabio Chigi (alias Pope Alexander vi) and his nephew Flavio (cardinal), donated to the Vatican Apostolic Library by the Italian state in 1924.

The Cappella Musicale di San Giacomo Maggiore in Bologna constitutes a vocal and instrumental group dedicated to the enhancement of the unpublished heritage of hidden treasures in the still unexplored musical archives. After the sacred works by Ippolito Ghezzi, Pirro Capacelli Albergati, and of the “Italian Seicento in Spanish style,” the team directed by Roberto Cascio tackles the genre of the eighteenth-century comic intermezzo, which had great fortune in its time among the composers of the theatrical genre, to then come up to the present day in the wake of the immortal Serva Padrona by Giovanni Battista Pergolesi. The two interludes proposed here are the “Palandrana and Zamberlucco” by Alessandro Scarlatti, the progenitor of that Eighteen century Neapolitan school in which Pergolesi will also grow, and the “Selvaggia and Dameta” by anonymous composer. Both works are centered on comic amorous quarrels performed by two characters brought to the stage by the vocal parts of a contralto and a bass.

On this release, Tactus continues the rediscovery of the archive of the S. Cristina monastery in Senigallia were are preserved a large amount of manuscripts by composer Giovanni Morandi, friend and collaborator of Rossini, married to the famous opera singer Rosa Morolli (acclaimed interpreter of the works of Rossini, Mozart, Cimarosa and Paisiello) and organ teacher to the nuns of the same convent. This chapter includes the organ transcriptions of operatic songs written by Morandi for the use of its nuns pupils (indisputable evidence of how the opera music could also come within the enclosure!). Morandi re-writes and adapts to the organ, symphonies and arias of the greatest opera composers of the time, Rossini's first and foremost, but also Verdi, Donizetti, Pacini, revealing interesting aspects on the performance practice of theatrical styles in the realization of the cadences or variations in the arias. Federica Iannella, specialist in nineteenth-century repertoire, here plays the Giacomo Bazzani 1856 organ, example of the organ theatrical aesthetics in the Marche region.

Classical Music

Classical Music

The latest Tactus CD from I Solisti Laudensi features works by six Italian composers (two by Vivaldi) active from the Baroque to the 20th c., in transcriptions for organ and strings accomplished in the 19th c, as well as a 20th c. piece for identical forces by the 20th c. composer Cardenio Botti. Founded in 1970, the I Solisti Laudensi ensemble’s many standout appearances have taking place at festivals and in concert halls throughout Italy and across Europe.

Angelo Berardi (1636–94) maintained in his day that modern music had reached “greater perfection compared to the past” and that the practice of music was more important than theory; he asserted, moreover, that a good composition should also elevate the soul to virtuous thoughts. In terms of his stylistic profile, Berardi shows great richness of inspiration, so much so that this, his only work assigned to the violin, seems to cover the entirety of the instrument’s abilities and expressive variety.

Born in Siena, Azzolino Della Ciaia was an italian organist, harpsichordist, composer and organ builder. He worked as an expert organ builder and most notably worked on the organ of Santo Stefano dei Cavalieri, a large 5-manual and more than 60 stop organ. Mara Fanelli and Olimpio Medori bring Ciaia's works to life with their rich musicianship.

Classical Music

The Centone di Sonate M.S. 112 is the last organic collection of sonate for violin and guitar composed by Paganini. The drawing up of this work, which is formed of 18 sonate evenly divided into three booklets (marked a, b and c) as was customary for a publication, probably began in Prague towards the end of 1828 and went on for several 11 years, during Paganini’s tour in Europe. It seems likely that the title Centone was attributed to the manuscripts after the composer’s death, during an operation of rearrangement of the unpublished material, with the purpose of generally indicating a collection of various pieces. Gianfranco Iannetta on violin and Walter Zanetti on guitar offer us the first six sonatas of the collection in a recording that for the first time is based solely on Paganini's autographed manuscripts.

The rationale of the programme presented by the Labirinto Armonico Ensemble is of a purely geographic nature: it offers a selection of works by three composers who were active in very different contexts between the beginning of the seventeenth century and the end of the eighteenth, but were united by the fact that they were all three natives of Abruzzi. Michele Mascitti, prominent violinist and composer, played a fundamental role in spreading the Italian style in France, making his fortune in Paris where he carried out his musical career; from there his fame extended to England and the Netherlands. Fedele Fenaroli, on the other hand, was a very important teacher and appreciated by Giuseppe Verdi for his treaty on the “Partimenti.” Giacomo Fornaci is the oldest of the three composers, of which only the collection of arias from included in this album have survived.

This double CD live recording is dedicated to the great pianistic romanticism of the 19th c. Here we can clearly feel how much Italian culture influenced the genius of Franz Liszt, who transposed on his favorite instrument all the magic of great opera (Verdi, Bellini, Donizetti), popular tradition (Venice and Naples) and classic literature (Dante, Petrarca). Literally enchanted by his Italian experience, Liszt composed music of rare effectiveness. Pianist Roberto Cappello has led a notable and highly successful career since his triumph at the 1976 Premio Busoni Int’l Piano Competition.

What paths did the composition of sacred music take at the beginning of this millennium? What is its relationship with liturgy? What prospects does it have? On the occasion of the centenary of the birth of Domenico Bartolucci (1917-2013), historic conductor of the choir of the Sistine Chapel and prolific composer, the Second National Conference of Composers of Sacred Music, promoted by the Associazione Italiana Santa Cecilia, was held in Rome from 1 to 3 September 2017. The conclusive Mass that was celebrated in St. Peter’s Basilica, in the Cappella del Coro, offered the chance to observe how today’s composers deal with the holy texts, ideally proceeding along the paths that since the first centuries of the Christian era, with time, branched out from the papal seat to the ends of the earth. Contrary to what happens at present in a widespread practice, the texts that are set to music in this celebration are not juxtaposed to the rite but spring from it, and the lexicon used by the composers – albeit with differences between the individual composers – aims to express the deep meaning of the celebration without misleading the listeners or shocking them with avant-garde languages and shifting their attention to matters that are foreign to the liturgical prayer.

Classical Music

Classical Music

Classical Music

Sandro Fuga was born in 1906 in Mogliano Veneto in the province of Treviso, but was Torinese by adoption. He studied piano under the guidance of Luigi Gallino; studied organ with Ulisse Matthey; and studied composition with Luigi Perrachio, Franco Alfano, and Giorgio Federico Ghedini. A cultured, elegant, and lovable artistic figure from a subalpine aristocratic background, Fuga was a refined and sensitive pianist, as well as a teacher of the highest caliber. He was a musician who made his own aesthetic belief and remained unscathed within the barrenness of the sterile shadows of a certain avantgarde, destined to grow old within l’espace d’un matin. Umberto Aleandri and Filippo Farinelli here are introducing us to the work including the three sonatas for cello and piano (two of which are world premiere recordings), clear emblem of the compositional ability of the author, teeming with pleasant and various writing solutions always elaborated with consummate skill and filtered by a great knowledge of the past tradition.

The recording of the third book of madrigals by Biagio Pesciolini, from Prato, is the outcome of a research on the figure of this composer that had begun in 2015. From this investigation, it emerged that no work of his has been published in modern notation until now. So the project started with a study on the sources and with the transcription of the third book of his madrigals, the only one that has been preserved in its entirety to this day. After a careful analysis of the work, it was possible to bring back to life this lost music, which turned out to be highly rich in nuances, contrasts and colours. So a missing piece of the musical history of the city of Prato and the Medici court of that time has finally been put back in its place. Elia Orlando conducts the Tuscæ Voces Ensemble, with the use of historical instruments.

Giovanni Battista Bassani, a late-Renaissance composer of great importance, has been all but ignored by posterity and recent studies. His music’s rediscovery brings to light the work of a great contrapuntist as well as creator of catchy melodies and surprising rhythmic solutions. His “Armonici Entuisiasmi di Davide”, printed in Venice in 1690, a collection of nine psalms, a Magnificat and the Litany of the Blessed Virgin, was for use during the liturgical year’s rites of Vespers. One of the leading specialists of music from this period, Giovanni Acciai, leads the Ensemble Ars Nova Cantandi.

The project entitled In the Sphere of Sound as Crossroad of Cultures wants to draw a semantic and aesthetic musical path based on the investigation of timbres carried out by the Italian comporary composers from Giacinto Scelsi to Biagio Putignano. The program on this recording shows the interweaving of different musical perspectives in order to interpret the idea of sound as "a crossroad of cultures".

Classical Music

Classical Music