The Song of Solomon translates from the Hebrew Sjier hasjiriem as 'The most beautiful song'. The songs woven through with eroticism, praise an idealised love between man and woman. Who is that lady, a wild lily in the valley, with eyes as doves, sick with love, whose lips drip with honey? And who is the man whose love is sweeter than wine, sleeping between her breasts as a gazelle, a bundle of myrrh? A more allegorical explanation might interpret the love between a man and a woman as representing God's love for Israel, mankind, etc. And may also be seen as an ode to the beauty of women, to Mary, the Virgin, the Mother of God like in the song Tota pulchra es: You are completely pure, Mary, and the stain of original sin is not within you. Your clothing is white like snow, and your face is like the sun. You are the glory of Jerusalem, you are the joy of Israel, you are the honoured of our people. Little is known about the Italian Franciscan monk Giacomo Finetti. His year of birth and death are unclear. Archival records tell us that he was working at the choir of the Duomo in Iesi around 1605 and 1606, and at the Chiesa del Santissimo Sacramento in Ancona from 1609 to 1612. After that he left for Venice, where he was appointed as organist of the Basilica di Santa Maria Gloriosa dei Frari. In the motets, dialogues and vesper psalms, including O Maria quae rapis corda hominum, from his collection Concerti ecclesiastici, printed in Antwerp in 1621, Finetti manages to depict the words in music using so-called imitation techniques. Finetti's music has been rescued from obscurity. It was found in the Bereson Library in Villa I Tatti, The Harvard University Center for Italian Renaissance Studies in Florence. Like on their previous album Io son ferito, Paulina van Laarhoven and her ensemble La Violetta once again demonstrate that in it's power of expression and emotion, the viola da gamba is equal to the human voice. Mary as the Mother of God, Mary as virgin, Mary as beauty, Immaculate Mary, Mary as Star of the Sea, Mary as Our Lady of Perpetual Help. Over the centuries in various countries her name and image may have changed, but Mary as mother will always remain: an ode to the woman who ensures security, protection and above all, love.
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Zefir Records
Pulchra es
The Song of Solomon translates from the Hebrew Sjier hasjiriem as 'The most beautiful song'. The songs woven through with eroticism, praise...
On this CD two of Mathieu van Bellens 'all-time favourites': Bach's second Partita (with the famous Chaconne and Bart�ks Solo Sonate. The third pieces is from the Zeeland composer Christian Blaha and makes a connection between Bach and Bartok. We hope you'll enjoy it as much as we did during the recording. Mathieu Van Bellen was born in the Netherlands, Hulst, 1988, and started studying the violin when he was 4. He studied in Belgium with Nico Baltussen, at the Amsterdam Conservatoire and at Chethams School of Music, Manchester, with the help of a scholarship of the VandenEnde Foundation, with Jan Repko, Royal College of Music, London with Itzhak Rashkovsky and Hochschule f�r Musik, Berlin, with Ulf Wallin. He had masterclasses with Ida Haendel, Shlomo Mintz, Pinchas Zukerman, Maxim Vengerov and Bernard Greenhouse. Laureate of Yehudi Menuhin Competition, Wieniawski Competition, Prinses Christina Competition and Oskar Back Competition he is also a recipient of MBF, RPS Emily Anderson Prize, Philharmonia Martin Musical Scholarship Fund Awards and Making Music Awards. He was also awarded the Bach Prize and the String Player of the Year 2008 at the Royal College of Music. He has given concerts in Europe, Asia and the USA, playing in major music festivals like Festspiele MV in Germany, Haagse 3daagse, and Chamber Music Festivals in Manchester. He has appeared several times on television and radio, and he performed in halls like the Purcell Room at the Southbank Centre, Royal Festival Hall London, Concertgebouw Amsterdam, Tel Aviv Opera House, and Megaron in Athens, performing as a soloist with orchestras such as the National Orchestra of Belgium, Holland Symfonia, Southbank Sinfonia, Philharmonia Chamber Orchestra, and Camerata Athena. Co-Founder of the Busch Ensemble, Mathieu is an active chamber musician, having played chamber music concerts with artists like Shlomo Mintz, Ani Schnarch, Mark Padmore, Roger Vignoles, among others, as well as with his ensemble, the Busch Ensemble. Graphic design by Paul & Menno de Nooijer. Photography Mathieu: Henri Berlize (Brussels). This CD was made possible with the support of Het Kersjes Fonds.
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Zefir Records
Bach, Blaha & Bartók: Violin Works
On this CD two of Mathieu van Bellens 'all-time favourites': Bach's second Partita (with the famous Chaconne and Bart�ks Solo Sonate. The...
Jacques Goudappel (1911-1995) was a wellknown choir conducter. The arrangements he made for these choirs of many operas and musical songs were published and spread all over the world. Goudappel's classical compositions, however were negelcted during his life time. Partly due to his modest character and partly due to the fact that his sensitive, lively, French oriented style didn't fit into the modernistic spirit of the sixties and seventies. But times have changed: when Goudappel's compositions were rediscovered in 2012 and performed in public, they won the acclaim of both musicians and listeners for their quality, depth and suitability for concert performance.
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Zefir Records
Goudappel: Chamber Music
Jacques Goudappel (1911-1995) was a wellknown choir conducter. The arrangements he made for these choirs of many operas and musical songs were...
In 1897 a baby was born named Francisco Mignone, son of Italian immigrants. A soft rain fell on the city of S�o Paulo, Brazil. Was this the first musical harmony that he ever experienced? Mignone was a born musician. He breathed music in via his parents and his brothers who were all musicians. His father Alferio Mignone was a brilliant flautist and mastered various other instruments as founder of the first symphony orchestra of S�o Paulo. He played flute, trumpet, cello, violin and a little piano, and also the small Francisco learned to play several different orchestral instruments. His mother Virginia sang opera arias and already at a young age Francisco revelled in the ambience of the musical soir�es held at his home, in which he also took part. Since Alferio Mignone was a music professor, he was always surrounded by singers whom Francisco accompanied on the piano. He quickly fell in love with opera and was able to work with famous singers from that day, such as Enrico Caruso and Bidu Say�o. At the age of 14 he already knew many an opera, but through playing for silent films he learned to improvise, as the musicians dimmed the lights after the last session and spun out accompaniments for a few films. And so began the life of Francisco Mignone... Mignone wrote 124 waltzes and the writer Manuel Bandeiro called him "The King of the Waltz". His most famous waltzes are the 12 Valsas de Esquina which he wrote in his young years. They were inspired by the serenades played on every street corner of S�o Paulo by small groups of violin, flute and cavaquinho, a small four-stringed guitar. The young Francisco belonged to those groups that delighted the girls of S�o Paulo, who swooned away at the sound of the music which reached them behind the curtains of their open windows. These Valsas de Esquina sprang forth from the popular spirit that was always present in the soul of the composer. These unparalleled, beautiful waltzes are all written in the minor key. Mignone was a cheerful person and was always in the mood for an outing or other diversion. He could in that way relax from his work. For 22 years I lived by his side, deeply happy, and in that time and after his death in 1986 I have dedicated myself to disseminating his musical oeuvre. A "Bravo" for Marcel Worms, who, under my guidance, has realised an important achievement as pianist by playing the works of Francisco Mignone. It is certain that this recording will be highly regarded. Maria Josephina Mignone - Rio de Janeiro, September 2013.
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Zefir Records
Mignone: Brazilian Dances for Piano
In 1897 a baby was born named Francisco Mignone, son of Italian immigrants. A soft rain fell on the city of S�o...
Soprano Lilian Farahani and pianist Maurice Lammerts van Bueren will combine their love for the music of American composer Jake Heggie (1961), with their passion for photography. They want to interpret Heggies compositions 'Eve-Song' and 'At the Statue of Venus' in both an auditory and visual way, by making an album with a corresponding photobooklet. "Women are definitely the stronger sex. I'm pretty sure the majority of men would not have the wherewithal to endure what is expected of women - nor what they have been subjected to throughout history. I was lucky enough to grow up around very powerful women who inspired and shaped me, and I have been compelled to tell their stories ever since. I am a diehard feminist." (Jake Heggie) "The two women represented on this recording might not seem to have a lot in common, but the Biblical Eve and the contemporary Rose are sisters to the core. They are dealing with what I find most interesting in all the characters I explore through dramatic music: a transformative crisis of identity. Questioning their lot in life in a moment of intensely vulnerable reflection. What could be more human? Eve-Song was Heggie's very first commission, written in 1995 for soprano Kristin Clayton on original texts by Philip Littell. At the Statue of Venus was composed 10 years later (2005) to a libretto by playwright Terrence McNally, and premiered again by Kristin Clayton. Not a song cycle, it is a real dramatic scena about a successful businesswoman waiting for a blind date in a museum, standing next to the goddess of love: the "feminine ideal" of Western culture. Old and new concepts of women and their roles crisscross through both of these works." (Lillian Farahani)
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Zefir Records
WOMAN the making of
Soprano Lilian Farahani and pianist Maurice Lammerts van Bueren will combine their love for the music of American composer Jake Heggie (1961),...
Douwe Eisenga House of Mirrors performed by Piccola Accademia degli Specchi Giovanni Rosati, piano Alessandra Amorino, flute Assunta Cavallari, piano, Claudia Di Pietro, sax Giuliano Cavaliere, violin Kyung Mi Lee, cello The Italian ensemble Piccolla Academia degli Specchi performs the music of Dutch composer Douwe Eisenga. Five brand new pieces and one reworking form a great collection of music that combines repetitive grooves and lyrical lines. Notes by the composer Motion The first ideas for Motion emerged in 2002 as a sketch for one of the parts of Requiem '53. Later, in 2007, this music evolved into the score for the short film Ports in Motion, commissioned by Zeeland Seaports. Inspired by the beautiful sound of Piccola Accademia degli Specchi (PADS) I made a completely new version in the beginning of 2011. Passacaglia My chamber opera Kabaal (Row) from 2001 tells the story of the historic feud between the Dutch naval heroes of the 17th century, Michiel de Ruyter and Cornelis Tromp. Halfway through the opera written for tenor, baritone and percussion, comes a touching aria, based on a simple descending four-note pattern. Over the years I have made several attempts to write an instrumental version of this aria. No luck, until 2011. Again, the combination of instruments of PADS formed the key to this version. Daily Music In 2007 the oldest newspaper in the Netherlands, the 'Zeeuwse Provinciale Courant' (PZC) celebrated it's 250th anniversary. The newspaper asked me to write a composition based on a 250-year old Sonata by the Dutch composer Christian Ernst Graf. The original and the resulting music for two baroque violins, baroque cello and harpsichord appeared on a privately released CD by the PZC. This new arrangement for PADS added two melodic lines to the original fabric of the voices. Kick The first version of Kick was composed in 2008 as Kick out the Muse, a work for chorus and orchestra based on texts by Federico Garcia Lorca. Lorca describes composing and performing music, as well as listening to music as a purely physical activity (sing with the sound of rushing blood). In the spring of 2011 I undertook a complete reworking of this music, resulting in this new piece Kick. Cloud Atlas The music of Cloud Atlas has come a long way. The origins for this piece is a song written for a show based on the novel The Man in Grey by Michael Ende. In 2007, a fully recomposed version of the music formed my contribution to Cloud Atlas, a project based on the famous novel by David Mitchell. Cloud Atlas was released as a live CD in 2008. Two years later, the version for two pianos appeared on my CD The Piano Files. This is the first studio recording of a brand new ensemble version. La Casa degli Specchi The beginning of La Casa degli Specchi emerged in 2009 as one of the possible ideas for Delta Dance, a composition I wrote for the Clazz Ensemble. The core of the piece consists of only five notes, reflected and mirrored in many, different ways. Piccola Accademia degli Specchi The Rome-based Piccola Accademia degli Specchi (PADS) is a so-called Pierrot Ensemble with piano4hands, cello, violin, sax & flute as line-up. The artistic director of this wonderful ensemble is the Italian composer Matteo Sommacal. The musical leader and one of the pianists is Giovanni Rosati. The other members are Assunta Cavallari, piano, Kyung Mi Lee, cello, Giuliano Cavaliere, violin, Claudia Di Pietro, sax, and Alessandra Amorino, flute. During the last couple of years the ensemble increased it's reputation in Italy and the US and started several collaborations with composers from all over the world, including Matthias Kadar, William Susman, Irma Ravinale and Demetrius Spaneas. In 2008 I met Matteo Sommacal on the social networking site MySpace. Discovering that our music shared some musical DNA, he quickly replied to my add: "Thanks for the add. Fantastic music. Actually, it seems that's true we share a close musical taste. Have you ever written anything for an ensemble? It would be a great pleasure to play your music in Italy". That was some kind of starting point. For a few years nothing happened until the summer of 2010 when Matteo mailed me: "We were wondering if there is a piece of yours that fits our line-up. We would be honoured and glad to have a piece of yours in our repertoire". We decided to do a reworking of Cloud Atlas and Daily Music. While working on those two pieces I quickly discovered that this particular combination of instruments fitted very well with my music. After a few more mails and Skype sessions we agreed to extend our collaboration... In July 2011 I went to Rome to attend rehearsals for this CD. It was a wonderful experience. PADS are a beautiful bunch of people. Each one of them is a highly gifted musician, fully devoted to my music. Working with PADS is a gift. August 2011, Douwe Eisenga The Dutch press on Douwe Eisenga: Music for Wiek VOLKSKRANT: "A magnificent ode to the cyclic movement' NRC: "Fascinating, gradually whipping music" Rose Road - City Lines VOLKSKRANT: 'Playful inventivity' TROUW: 'Colorful and sublime' PZC: 'Irresistible groove, mesmerizing' ?Requiem 1953 NRC: 'Enchanting requiem, strong music' The Piano Files Klasssieke Zaken : "Music with a generosity that has no borders" Plato Mania: "Enchanting and inspiring"
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Zefir Records
House of Mirrors
Douwe Eisenga House of Mirrors performed by Piccola Accademia degli Specchi Giovanni Rosati, piano Alessandra Amorino, flute Assunta Cavallari, piano, Claudia Di...
Around 1990, my love for both contemporary classical music and jazz resulted in a "love child": the crossover of the two genres, modern composed music with jazz influences. Especially during the 1920s, composers were bitten by the jazz bug, whereas by 1990 it seemed that further development of this genre was clearly in decline. It was my opinion that commissioning composers for new works could provide a new impulse. My passion for the blues and the blues form in particular were the motivation for these commissions, which resulted in the first new Dutch blues compositions for the project in 1996, followed soon after by international contributions. The blues is one of the elementary foundations of jazz and it's form provides the composer with a clear blueprint which I thought might increase the chance of my re-quest being fulfilled. Moreover, choosing the blues as premise would provide a certain coherence between the composed pieces. The composers were free to apply the blues in their own manner. The blue notes, the three fundamental chords, the blues keys, and the scheme of 12, 16 or 32 measures could all be used, but were not prerequisite. There was also room for improvisation. The only essential requirement was that each composer, in his own individual way, should try to make the soul of the blues audible, as well as it's associated state of mind. The tenth anniversary, in 2006, of my project New Blues for Piano in which, up to that time, some 150 composers from 50 countries had participated, was a good reason to publish some of the 60 new Dutch compositions. The Dutch publishing house Donemus released two volumes with 31 blues scores by Dutch composers, including a recording of the repertoire on CD. After that, it became obvious to me that an anthology of the international repertoire of the project should also be published, including a CD recording, as in the Dutch version. I am very grateful to Peermusic Classical Hamburg for their immediate and positive response to this idea. Some of the works represented in the score editions of Peermusic Classical have already been recorded and released by me in the past. With this CD, I'd now like to present the other pieces to a wider audience as first recordings. I tried, as much as possible, to achieve cultural diversity in the choice of repertoire, which, as of now, includes almost 200 compositions. If there is one community that can be called multicultural, then it surely is music.
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Zefir Records
Blues Beyond Borders
Around 1990, my love for both contemporary classical music and jazz resulted in a "love child": the crossover of the two genres,...
The Dutch composer Douwe Eisenga presents on The Piano Files a selection of his work for one, two and even four pianos. Eisenga is a real eclecticus and does with every style what he wants. The musical history is his hunting area. The Piano Files reflects Eisenga's affinity with Minimal Music. Discovering Eisenga by means of his piano compositions is a must. The music is performed by Jeroen van Veen, Sandra van Veen and Marcel Worms. Press Quotes: "Enchanting and inspiring" ? "Music with a generosity that has no borders" 'The compositions manage to captivate the listener by their unexpected influences of other elements from the history of music and a greatly varied language of tone, remaining within the limits of minimalism' Cloud Atlas is written in 2008 for the production Cloud Atlas - together with pieces from five other composers - inspired by the novel of David Mitchell, who wrote about this piece: "Eisenga's composition is beautiful, It is joyous, transcendent, and makes me homesick for a place I've never been". Les Chants Estivaux (The Summer Songs) is a quadraphonic composition for four pianos. During the Dutch premiere in 2009 the audience could walk around in a special installation, build by O+A Architects. The special character of the piece fits perfect to a setting that was common tot the Minimal Music Performances in the 1980s. Les Chants Estivaux is music for everlasting summers. Theme I is one of the earliest pieces Douwe Eisenga wrote. The music is exemplary for all his later work: steady repeated patterns, combined with lyrical melodies. City Lines was written in 2006 and was composed and inspired by hearing Tubular Bells again after may years and Simeon ten Holt's Horizon. The result was this enchanting music, based on a Dutch Folk Tune, evolving into a lovely, pianistic written piece of music. Growing Worm was written for the new-blues-project from Dutch pianist Marcel Worms. To be honest, the music contains no blues at all.
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Zefir Records
Douwe Eisenga: The Piano Files
The Dutch composer Douwe Eisenga presents on The Piano Files a selection of his work for one, two and even four pianos....
The oratorio developed out of paraliturgical devotional practices of the Oratorian order during the sixteenth century. By the seventeenth century, it had grown into an independent genre and spread rapidly across Europe. Giacomo Carissimi, chapel master at the German College in Rome from 1629 to 1674, was considered the main exponent of the genre and one of the leading composers of church music as a whole. So much so, that princes from across Europe frequently sent their musicians to be trained under him, or even attempted-without success-to recruit him for their own courts. Jephte was Carissimi's most successful and long-lasting composition. Athanasius Kircher printed part of it's final chorus already in his Musurgia universalis (Rome 1650), the whole work soon became widely disseminated through manuscript copies, and Handel still drew inspiration from it for his oratorio Samson. The key to the oratorio's success lies in it's text, a paraphrase of Judges 11.27-38, which offered Carissimi the material to create a complete drama of varied emotional charge within a short space of time: Before Jephthah takes the Israelites into battle against the Ammonites he vows to God that if he be victorious, he would sacrifice the first living being that comes to meet him upon his return. The ensuing battle scene depicts graphically with warlike music the devastation of the Ammonite army. Jephthah's triumphant homecoming takes a tragic turn when he is met by his only daughter who in a heroic gesture gives herself up to be sacrificed in order for her father to keep his sacred vow. The final chorus, arguably one of the finest pieces of vocal ensemble music ever written, expresses in increasingly dense chains of dissonant suspensions the Israelites' grief for Jephthah's daughter. The multiplicity of early surviving sources of Jephte, along with the absence of an autograph score makes it difficult to determine the precise Urtext of the work. The most reliable source is a copy in the hand of Carissimi's student Marc-Antoine Charpentier (now in the Biblioth�que National, Paris). Stripped of it's obviously French elements, it served as the basis of this recording. The major differences between the various sources concern the final chorus. Therefore, this movement is included twice on this recording, placing alternative readings side by side. Track 11 represents the shorter and presumably original version, whilst track 12 contains an insertion of eleven bars after the repeat of the A-section, which cannot be found in any surviving source, but goes back to Friedrich Chrysander's edition (Bergedorf 1869). Regrettably, Chrysander never published a commentary elucidating the origin of this version. However, it is believed that he had access to sources in Hamburg and Berlin which were lost during World War II. Although the expansion has entered many subsequent editions and has enjoyed some popularity due to it's daring harmonic progressions, it's authenticity is highly questionable: the absence of early sources aside, contrapuntal faults in this section go beyond rhetorical licenses commonly employed in this work or in Carissimi's oeuvre as a whole. Lastly, in the last bars of the movement, track 12 reproduces the reading of a source in the Royal College of Music in London, containing a written out ritardando. Antonio Bertali left his native city of Verona in 1624 to work in Vienna, where he secured himself a position as instrumentalist, teacher, and composer at the imperial court in 1631. After Giovanni Valentini's death in 1649, Bertali succeeded him as imperial chapel master, a post which he held until his own death in 1669. Directing one of Europe's largest and best funded musical institutions for two decades gained him an international reputation as one of the foremost composers of his century. Like many composers of the seventeenth century, he fell into oblivion soon after 1700; his historical significance and the high quality of his many surviving works have yet to be fully appreciated. The historically unlikely slaughter of the innocent children by King Herod, as reported in Mt 2.16-18, was a popular subject in Vienna and at the imperial court. Relics of the Innocents were venerated at St Stephen's Cathedral and at the Cappuchin Church. Emperor Ferdinand III, Bertali, and his successor Felice Sances composed numerous works on the topic. La strage degl'Innocenti is Bertali's only surviving oratorio. It has been preserved in a single fair copy in the 'bedchamber collection' of Emperor Leopold I and is now kept in the music collection of the Austrian National Library in Vienna. The work is dated 1665 and was presumably first performed in the Hofburgkapelle of the imperial court. For the oratorio's first part, the anonymous librettist adapted a scene from Giambattista Marino's epic poem La strage degl'Innocenti, although only a single line from it is quoted verbatim. It portrays King Herod amidst his counsellors, in fear of being deposed in favour of the new boy king who was allegedly born in his kingdom. Whilst the first two counsellors confirm Herod's rage and advise him to go ahead with the planned slaughter of the children, the third counsellor warns Herod against the consequences of such cruelty and the folly of acting against the divine plan. Having silenced the third counsellor, Herod and his ministers proceed to the massacre. The second half of the libretto focuses on three mothers lamenting their children's fate whilst Herod's soldiers draw near. All tears being in vain, the killing goes ahead. The final chorus bewails the dying children and submits that heaven will take it's revenge in time. Whilst Bertali tends to write conservatively in his liturgical works, he shows himself as more progressive in his oratorio. He creates extended coherent musical units by using musical cross-references and repeats (e.g. tracks 21-24 and 27); some passages are rhetorically daring such as the short trio (track 29) in which the three mothers' anger is illustrated through noticeable contrapuntal errors. Frequent use of chromaticism and diminished intervals serve as means of text expression, such as the threefold begging gesture "senti, senti, Signore" on a falling tritone which punctuates the recitative of the third counsellor (track 20). Bertali's mastery becomes fully apparent in the remarkable final chorus in which imitative madrigal style is finely balanced by homophonic writing, and chromatic density by harmonic commonplaces. Notes on the performance Pitch: Pitch standards varied widely during the seventeenth century. The pitch of a'= 466 Hz (i.e. a semitone above 'modern' pitch) chosen for this recording approximates a practice that was common for church music in many countries. It was certainly used throughout the Habsburg lands and is therefore appropriate for Bertali's sacred music. However, Roman pitch, which Carissimi wrote for, was exceptionally low (ca. a'= 384 Hz or about a whole tone below 'modern' pitch). Hence, this recording of Jephte was performed about a minor third higher than Carissimi himself would presumably have done. Nevertheless, none of the many copies of the work which circulated throughout Europe make use of transposition in order to compensate for higher local pitch standards. Therefore it seems that performances of the work at a higher pitch were not uncommon. Ritardando: The use of ritardando at the end of a movement or section by default appears to have been unusual in seventeenth-century ensemble music. Rather, composers employed it rarely as a special effect and often went to some length to indicate it, either by description (e.g. Matthew Locke: 'slower by degrees') or simply by writing it out in larger note values. The latter is the case in the final movement of Jephte in the copy of the Royal College (see above; track 12). Accordingly, ritardando is applied very sparingly in this recording; instead, long held final notes serve as an alternative to gather excess energy at the end of movements. Instruments: Sources of seventeenth-century music are frequently unspecific about the precise instrumentation of a work, or indeed whether instruments are to be added at all. Careful hermeneutics in the study of sources and knowledge about historical conventions can provide pointers in the right direction. Bertali's oratorio only specifies two treble and a bass instrument for the sinfonias and ritornelli. The range and idiom of these sections suggest violins for the treble parts; the use of a dulcian for the instrumental bass commends itself, because this line-up of instruments was common during the seventeenth century, and Bertali himself wrote several works for this combination. Most sources of Carissimi's Jephte do not call for any instruments besides the continuo. However, the addition of doubling instruments is a common feature in many of Carissimi's oratorios. Moreover, early sources of Jephte in Versailles, Oxford, and Hamburg provide such parts (or in the latter case at least the space for them) for the six-part choruses. Following this practice, in the recording the two top sopranos and the bass were doubled instrumentally in those sections. The same principle was applied to Bertali's oratorio. The nature and form of it's only surviving source make it unlikely, if not impossible, that the addition of doubling instruments in the final choruses would have been notated. The doubling parts were therefore supplemented by the performers.
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Slaughter & Sacrifice
The oratorio developed out of paraliturgical devotional practices of the Oratorian order during the sixteenth century. By the seventeenth century, it had...
Canto Ostinato (1976-1979) The first performance of Canto Ostinato took place on April 25th 1979 in the Ru�nekerk in Bergen (The Netherlands) and was realized using three pianos and an electronic organ. Canto stems from a traditional source, is tonal and makes use of functional harmony, it is built according to the laws of cause and effect (tension-release). Although all parts of Canto have their fixed position in it's progress and are not interchangeable without violating the melodic line, the internal logic and form, beginning and end do not have absolute meaning as boundaries, of form. Time plays an important role in Canto. Although most bars or sections feature repeat signs and although the performer(s) decide(s) on the number of repeats, one cannot speak of repetition-as-such. Repetition in this case has as it's goal to create a situation in which the musical object affirms it's indep endence and can search for it's most favorable position with respect to the light thrown on it, becoming transparent. Time becomes the space in which the musical object floats. The performers have a wide margin of contribution. They decide about dynamic contrast, duration (in detail as well as for the whole), about the use of opposing or non-opposing timbre differentiations, whether or not to play passages in unison. A performance of Canto is more like a ritual experience than a regular concert.
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Zefir Records
Simeon ten Holt: Canto ostinato
Canto Ostinato (1976-1979) The first performance of Canto Ostinato took place on April 25th 1979 in the Ru�nekerk in Bergen (The Netherlands)...