[ Decca / CD ]
Release Date: Friday 23 June 2017
With this album I Fagiolini balances the usual bias in favour of the 1610 Vespers. While '1610' includes the five Vespers psalms suitable to feasts of the Blessed Virgin and other female saints, it does not include a full set for any male saints: these were included in Monteverdi's 1641 publication, 'Selva Morale e spirituale'. A choirmaster at the time would have needed both publications and our selection is taken from the latter volume.
Their inspiration is the occasion on June 24th 1620 when Monteverdi was seen by a Dutch visitor directing the Vespers for the Feast of the Nativity of John the Baptist at a church away from St Mark's. The psalms chosen and the plainchant is for that feast.
As well as the main Vespers items, the recording includes intriguing extras: improvisatory violin sonata, sensuous Song of Songs motet, and most unusually divisions (ornamentation) based on music by Palestrina and performed by the ravishing soundworld of cornetto muto and four voices.
Gramophone Award Nomination 2018 - Choral
"a rich compilation...all the performances under Robert Hollingworth using professional and younger voices are gently moulded, resonantly beautiful: a noble celebration." The Observer, 7th May 2017 ****
"The performances are exhilarating, especially the accelerandos." The Times, 12th May 2017 *****
"There is plenty of warmth and animation in the superb music-making. I Fagiolini's consort and solo singing are exemplary...In such sure hands (and throats) as these, Monteverdi's psalm-settings reach their fullest capacity to enchant and astonish." Gramophone Magazine Editor's Choice, July 2017
1. Viadana: Deus in adiutorium meum
2. Antiphon I
3. Monteverdi: Dixit Dominus SV264
4. Giovanni Pierluigi da Palestrina, Giovanni Battista Bovicelli: Ave verum corpus
5. Antiphon II
6. Monteverdi: Confitebor tibi Domine, SV266
7. Donati, I: Dulcis amor Iesu
8. Antiphon III
9. Monteverdi: Beatus Vir, SV268
10. Antiphon III (Reprise)
11. Antiphon IV
12. Monteverdi: Laudate pueri, SV270
13. Castello, D: Sonata in D minor
14. Antiphon V
15. Monteverdi: Laudate Dominum, SV272a
16. Frescobaldi: Toccata in G
17. Chapter - Plainchant
18. Monteverdi: Ut queant laxis, SV279a
19. Magnificat Antiphon
20. Gabrieli, G: Magnificat a14
21. Usper: Sonata à 8
22. Benedicamus Domino - Plainchant
23. Monteverdi: Salve, O Regina, SV326