Composer: Girolamo Frescobaldi, Andrea Gabrieli, Giovanni Gabrieli, Giovanni Giacomo Gastoldi, Sigismondo d’India, Johannes Hieronymous Kapsberger, Claudio Giovanni Antonio Monteverdi, Giaches de Wert
Performer: Concerto di Margherita
Format: FLAC (tracks)
Label: Arcana
Catalogue: A498
Release: 2022
Size: 441 MB
Recovery: +3%
Scan: yes
01. Monteverdi: Dolci miei sospiri
02. Gabrieli: Canzon prima à cinque, Ch. 195
03. Kapsberger: S’io sospiro e s’io piango
04. Kapsberger: Veri diletti qua giù non regnano
05. Wert: Chi mi fura il ben mio?
06. Wert: Cara la vita mia e gl’è pur vero
07. Baviera: Cara la vita mia (Arr. with Diminutions by Giovanna Baviera)
08. Frescobaldi: Canzona terza à 2, F 8.14c
09. India: Occhi de’ miei desiri e d’amor nidi
10. Gabrieli: O belli e vaghi pizzi
11. Gabrieli: O belli e vaghi pizzi
12. India: Occhi belli, occhi sereni
Gastoldi: Cieco Amor non ti cred’io
13. I. Cieco Amor non ti cred’io
14. II. Ma tu, pur perfido cieco
15. III. Sciolto cor fa piè fugace
16. IV. Mira nume trionfante
Wert: O primavera, gioventù de l’anno
17. I. O primavera, gioventù de l’anno
18. II. O dolcezz’ amarissime d’amore
19. III. Ma se le mie speranz’ oggi non sono
20. IV. E, s’altri non n’inganna
21. V. Oh lungamente sospirato in vano
A young ensemble of instrumentalists and singers revives the precious historical practice of singers accompanying themselves (already brought back into currency by the soloist Vivabiancaluna Biffi), thus producing a wholly new sound in music usually assigned to unaccompanied voices. With Concerto di Margherita, self-accompanied singing becomes “collective” for the first time in our era, and is amplified in a shared gesture in which all the members of the group – playing and singing together with extraordinary coordination – produce a sonority unprecedented in this repertory.
Created at the Schola Cantorum Basiliensis in Switzerland, the group (which is named after the Duchess of Ferrara, Margherita Gonzaga) performs as a consort of five voices, theorbo, harp, viola da gamba, guitar and lutes, inspired by the “Concerto delle dame” of Ferrara. The recording debut of Concerto di Margherita presents arrangements of a wide range of instrumental and vocal works (madrigals, villanellas and canzonas), drawing on music by De Wert, Gastoldi, Monteverdi and the “blind man’s buff” scene from Giovanni Battista Guarini’s Il pastor fido (1580).