Composer: Claudio Monteverdi
Performer: Pygmalion
Conductor: Raphaël Pichon
Number of Discs: 2
Format: FLAC (tracks)
Label: Harmonia Mundi
Catalogue: HMM93271011
Release: 2024
Size: 1.85 GB
Recovery: +3%
Scan: yes
CD 01
Vespro della Beata Vergine, SV 206
01. Invitatorium. Versiculum et responsorium “Deus in adjutorium”
02. Psalmus “Dixit dominus”
03. Concerto “Nigra sum”
04. Psalmus “Laudate Pueri”
05. Concerto “Pulchra es”
06. Psalmus “Laetatus sum”
07. Concerto “Duo Seraphim”
08. Psalmus “Nisi Dominus”
09. Concerto “Audi, cœlum”
CD 02
Vespro della Beata Vergine, SV 206
01. Psalmus “Lauda Jerusalem”
02. Sancta Maria, succurre miseris, SV 328
Vespro della Beata Vergine, SV 206
03. Sonata a 8 sopra Sancta Maria
04. Hymnus “Ave maris stella”
05. Magnificat anima mea dominum
06. Et exultavit
07. Quia respexit
08. Quia fecit
09. Et misericordia
10. Fecit potentiam
11. Deposuit
12. Esurientes
13. Suscepit Israel
14. Sicut locutus est
15. Gloria Patri
16. Sicut erat
17. Conclusio (versiculum et responsorium) “Domine, exaudi orationem meam”
Their new Vespers is impeccably authentic from top to bottom, and yet at the same time it’s big, operatic and vigorous. Don’t let the blockbuster opening alarm you; this is not a uniformly crash-bang-wallop account. Far from it. The contrast between the first movement and the first of the psalm-settings, Dixit Dominus, is enormous..This could very well be the performance of the Vespers to have.
There is a sense of religious devotion to be heard here, as of course there should be, but what is so powerful is the expressive urgency that Pichon, his soloists and his Pygmalion ensemble so fervently bring to the music. If period performance still aims, as it always has, to restore the shock of the old for the ears of today, then this is period performance at close to its very best.
It is hard to know where to begin enumerating the beauties of this release by the Pygmalion ensemble and its director, Raphaël Pichon, who enumerates his thoughts on Monteverdi’s Vespro della Beata Vergine in the interview-style booklet. There are many good recordings of this work, sometimes known as the Vespers of 1610. Right from the beginning, with the exultant blaze of unchanging harmony in the opening Invitatorium that announced, just as clearly as anything in the opera Orfeo, that the musical world had changed, the effect of this performance is exceptionally powerful, but it is not only the glittering tutti that impresses. Perhaps even more than Orfeo, the Vespers marshal all the musical resources Monteverdi had at his disposal. There are operatic arias in all but text, handled perfectly by well-chosen soloists who master the ornamentation idioms of the day. There are polychoral brass pieces that show Monteverdi’s development of that style prior to his move to St. Mark’s in Venice. There is old-school polyphony and straight monody. In Pichon’s hands, all these styles are held in perfect balance. Harmonia Mundi’s sound, from the Temple du Saint-Esprit in Paris, evokes the splendor of the ducal chapel in Mantua for which the Vespers were written. There is much more that could be said, but let it suffice to observe that even those who think they know the Vespers well will rethink that position after hearing this remarkable recording, which rightfully made classical best-seller charts in the late summer of 2023.