Early Music Round-up,
Early Music Round-Up - February 2023
Byrd and Weelkes bound into the limelight for 2023, with both composers the focus of attention thanks to the 400th anniversary of their deaths falling this year. The King's Singers, Fretwork, Stile Antico and Daniel-Ben Pienaar are among those keeping the feast.
Also recently released is a fascinating revival of the long-forgotten original version of a Zoroastrian-inspired, distinctly Masonic-flavoured opera in which forces of light and dark do battle in a fantastical, magic-imbued setting. Sound familiar? Rameau's Zoroastre blazes the trail for Mozart's later Die Zauberflöte, and Alexis Kossenko has assembled an all-star cast (Jodie Devos, Véronique Gens, Reinoud van Mechelen) to show the work off in all its glory.
Elsewhere, InAlto and Lambert Colson present a glorious programme of often dark-hued works featuring low brass and choir, celebrating the trombone family's role in musical ceremony down the ages; Rachel Podger traces the ancestry of Bach's senza basso compositions for violin; and Andrew Lawrence-King's Gothic Voices revel in the soaring musical architecture of Dufay and his Burgundian contemporaries in a Florence-inspired album.
Recordings
Exploring the role of low brass instruments in ceremonial music, InAlto present an impressive programme ranging from the uplifting serenity of Bach's O Jesu Christ to the pathos of Schütz's Fili mi, Absalon, as well as funerary works by Beethoven, Buxtehude and Becker. Martin Mayer's Da der Tag ein Ende nahm stands out as especially atmospheric. It's not all seriousness and solemnity, though, with sprightly works by Krieger, Christoph Strauss and Ahle lightening the mood.
Available Formats: CD, MP3, FLAC, Hi-Res FLAC, Hi-Res+ FLAC
Taking a break from his monumental survey of the complete works of JS Bach - himself part of an influential musical dynasty - Benjamin Alard turns his attention to another such family, with a recital of works by Louis, Armand-Louis and François Couperin. Louis's Tombeau de M de Blancrocher, written in memory of a famous lutenist, is a particular highlight, with Alard embracing the work's inward-looking melancholy, while a selection from François's pictorial miniatures offers thumbnail sketches of the nightingale, the linnet (suitably alarmed), warblers and, of course, the ever-mysterious baricades.
Available Formats: CD, MP3, FLAC, Hi-Res FLAC
Rameau: Zoroastre 1749
Jodie Devos (Amélite), Véronique Gens (Erinice), Reinoud Van Mechelen (Zoroastre), Tassis Christoyannis (Abramane), Les Ambassadeurs, La Grande Écurie, Chœur de Chambre de Namur, Alexis Kossenko
Never before recorded, the 1749 version of Rameau's Zoroastre shows the composer as not merely a musical innovator but a dramatic one - prefiguring Mozart's Zauberflöte by embracing the duality between good and evil, light and darkness, and abandoning Greco-Roman influences in favour of the Persian tradition of Zoroastrianism. The result is a work that would have been divisive enough on its own merits even if it had not fallen victim to the machinations of Rameau's rivals - which, sadly, it did - but which weaves together a fantastical battle between rival magicians, a love triangle, and blockbuster special effects into a feast for the senses.
Available Formats: 3 CDs, MP3, FLAC, Hi-Res FLAC
2023 brings a double anniversary - the deaths of both William Byrd and Thomas Weelkes. The King's Singers and Fretwork, both acclaimed groups in their own right, come together to present a programme of works celebrating the two men's artistry, as well as newly-commissioned tributes by James MacMillan and Roderick Williams. Byrd's haunting elegy for Tallis, Ye Sacred Muses, is as powerful as ever; the globe-trotting Thule, the period of cosmography appropriately kaleidoscopic; and listen out for Christopher Bruerton and Nick Ashby getting in touch with their inner Wurzels in the rustic Who made thee, Hob.
Available Formats: CD, MP3, FLAC, Hi-Res FLAC
Forza azzurri! Music by Dall’Abaco, Brescianello, Sammartini, Vivaldi and Zavateri
La Serenissima, Adrian Chandler
Not the first of Adrian Chandler's football-related albums and unlikely to be the last, Forza Azzurri! sees La Serenissma join forces with star recorder player Tabea Debus for another wander down the byways of the Italian Baroque. The focus this time is on contemporaries of Vivaldi, such as Zavateri (an early innovator toward the galante style), Giuseppe Sammartini (hailed by Quantz as 'the only good wind player' in the Milanese theatre orchestra), and Brescianello and Dall'Abaco, both of whom bounced around war-torn Europe like pinballs, working variously in Bavaria, France, Belgium and Württemburg and absorbing stylistic influences en route.
Available Formats: CD, MP3, FLAC, Hi-Res FLAC
Contrasting with the King's Singers-Fretwork collaboration in both repertoire and approach, Stile Antico's anniversary tribute to Byrd focuses on his intense sacred music, with a programme built around his Mass for Four Voices. The complex and expressive Tribue, Domine, a motet lasting almost a quarter of an hour, offsets more modest works such as a pair of ninety-second graduals on the text Assumpta est Maria. The juxtaposition of Praise our Lord, all ye Gentiles and Laudate Dominum omnes gentes - setting the same text in English and Latin - also throws into particularly sharp relief the religious turmoil of Byrd's time and his own deft adaptation to changing political climates.
Available Formats: CD, MP3, FLAC, Hi-Res FLAC, Hi-Res+ FLAC
Rinaldo Alessandrini and his musicians bring Monteverdi's unprecedentedly theatrical and soloistic seventh book of madrigals to thrilling life - the collection is subtitled 'Concerto' and in this performance it's easy to see why. The 'professionalisation' of the madrigal, and the move away from vocal-consort polyphony to a combination of vocal soloists and instrumentalists, parallels the rise of opera - and Concerto Italiano's performances indeed sound as though they could have been lifted straight out of L'Orfeo, right down to the first-person opening sonnet reminiscent of La Musica.
Available Formats: 2 CDs, MP3, FLAC, Hi-Res FLAC
Showcasing the pinnacle of the Franco-Flemish school, this album includes Dufay's soaring Nuper rosarum flores written for the consecration of Florence's iconic Duomo in 1436, and his haunting O très piteulx composed in response to the fall of Constantinople to Mehmed II in 1453. Arranged around these two large-scale works is a selection of instrumental and vocal works by Ockeghem, Busnois, Compère and others - all taken from collections published in Florence and demonstrating the city's magnetic pull on the artistic and the cultured, then as now.
Available Formats: CD, MP3, FLAC, Hi-Res FLAC
Emily Owen and Jenni Harper's perfectly-matched voices work wonders in this Purcell-centred collection subtitled 'Songs from the English Restoration'. Both sopranos have a bright tone that gives a pleasant zing to the livelier numbers (such as the opening duet), while lending a distinct clarity to the more downbeat pieces and keeping them well clear of wallowing melancholy - even the despondently-titled O Let Me Weep. Intermixed with the stage songs are a delightful collection of instrumental 'interludes', with harpsichordist Satoko Doi-Luck and lutenist Toby Carr very impressive in their moments in the spotlight.
Available Formats: CD, MP3, FLAC, Hi-Res FLAC
After a 2021 album by Kit Armstrong did much to win me round to the idea of early music on the modern piano, I thought I'd try some more - and along came Daniel-Ben Pienaar with a new volume of just that. His collection of Pavans, Galliards and more by Byrd brings out the virtuosic side of these works, as well as their often rapidly-shifting emotional colours. The nine-minute Quadran Pavan makes a particularly strong impression in Pienaar's hands - a serious work of serious scope - while the lighter works dedicated to named patrons are by contrast charming and even quirky.
Available Formats: 2 CDs, MP3, FLAC, Hi-Res FLAC
Tracing the ancestry of Bach's beloved works for solo violin, Rachel Podger begins with Chad Kelly's transcription of the famous Toccata and Fugue in D minor (here reworked - or perhaps restored - as an unaccompanied violin piece in A minor that my colleague Katherine aptly summed up as "nifty"), before heading down less-trodden paths with equally impressive senza basso pieces by Vilsmayr, Matteis, Westhoff and others. Last November I was fortunate enough to be able to discuss this album with Rachel in more depth.
Available Formats: SACD, MP3, FLAC, Hi-Res FLAC, Hi-Res+ FLAC
Books
In Bach in the World, author Markus Rathey offers a new exploration of how Bach's music functioned as an agent of affective communication within rituals, such as the installation of the town council, and as a place where socio-political norms were perpetuated and sometimes even challenged. The book does so by analyzing public manifestations of the social order during Bach's time in large-scale celebrations, processions, public performances, and visual displays.
Available Format: Book
The Cambridge Companion to Seventeenth-Century Opera is a much-needed introduction to one of the most defining areas of Western music history - the birth of opera and its developments during the first century of its existence. From opera's Italian foundations to its growth through Europe and the Americas, the volume charts the changing landscape - on stage and beyond - which shaped the way opera was produced and received.
Available Format: Book
David Smith - Head of Digital
