MONTEVERDI Madrigals Books 7 & 8
View record and artist detailsRecord and Artist Details
Composer or Director: Claudio Monteverdi
Genre:
Vocal
Label: Harmonia Mundi
Magazine Review Date: 04/2017
Media Format: CD or Download
Media Runtime: 74
Mastering:
DDD
Catalogue Number: HAF890 5278
Tracks:
Composition | Artist Credit |
---|---|
Madrigals, Book 7 (Concerto: settimo libro de madr |
Claudio Monteverdi, Composer
(Les) Arts Florissants Vocal Ensemble Claudio Monteverdi, Composer Paul Agnew, Director |
Madrigals, Book 8 (Madrigali guerrieri et amorosi. |
Claudio Monteverdi, Composer
(Les) Arts Florissants Vocal Ensemble Claudio Monteverdi, Composer Paul Agnew, Director |
Author: Edward Breen
And what a journey! Just compare the opening of this album to that of Vol 1 to grasp how far Monteverdi’s dense, intense textures have expanded, and how the singers have grown with them. Take, for instance, the little-recorded ‘Al lume delle stelle’, where rising vocal phrases unfurl and look towards the stars as Tirsi is reminded of the glint in his lover’s eyes. The phrasing is incredibly spacious and, even at its slowest, text is always the driving force, to the extent that one can almost taste it. In the solo madrigals, Miriam Allan’s sublime singing in ‘Con che soavità’ is delicately imbued with a knowing glint. And in the extraordinary ‘Lettera amorosa’ Lucile Richardot finds a breathless immediacy quite different from Montserrat Figueras’s long, languid opening phrases (Alia Vox, 2014) but equally engaging.
As the focus shifts to Book 8, the diaphanous singing of Hannah Morrison and Miriam Allan in ‘Dolcissimo usignolo’, in which Paul Agnew introduces voices in a sequential fashion, shows the remarkable balance of these performances. The disc ends with ‘Il combattimento di Tancredi e Clorinda’, famous for its stile rappresentativo. Here I prefer a more imposing narrator and more closely miked instruments, such as found on record by Rinaldo Alessandrini (Naïve, 12/98), yet the vivid atmosphere of Agnew’s performance is palpable and, as so often in these discs, his text-driven subtlety wins over.
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