Regular readers will recall that for some time I have been quietly praying for another record of Emma Kirkby singing some of Monteverdi's pieces for solo voice. As a repertory it has never (except for one or two works) received as much attention from performers and companies as the operas, large-scale church works and madrigals. But in the invigorating and cosmopolitan circumstances in which the composer found himself after his appointment as maestro at St Mark's in Venice in 1613, it was precisely such intimate pieces for one or two voices, simple accompaniment, and occasionally a couple of added instruments that occupied much of his time. They could be presented in the grand houses of Monteverdi's Venetian patrons with the minimum of effort (and expense); he seems to have written them throughout the 30 years that he spent in the city.
My prayers have now been answered. Emma Kirkby and Evelyn Tubb are well matched with a fine sense of the rhetorical basis of the style. Both add a good deal of improvised ornamentation in an entirely persuasive and stylistically-appropriate way, it has no doubt been carefully worked out and rehearsed, but creates the aural effect of a spontaneous reaction to Monteverdi's text. This is convinced and convincing singing of a high order. If anything Evelyn Tubb has a slightly sharper edge to her tone, and her style of delivery is more operatic, as can be heard to good effect in her thoughtfully dramatic reading of the ''Lamento di Penelope'' from Il ritorno d'Ulisse in patria. This brings a spice and tension to some of the duets notably at the spine-chillingly dissonant opening of Ohime, dov'e il mio ben?. Within the constraints of the style the choice of pieces is imaginative (and instructive about the extent to which Monteverdi's idioms are so readily exchanged between sacred and secular pieces), and the changing instrumentation for continuo parts lends additional variety. The result is a delight. My one criticism is of the decision to include only the barest of supporting material with the disc—a useful but all-too-brief historical note, and neither texts nor translations.'