Josef Mysliveček (1737-1781) Adamo ed Eva Oratorio for four voices (1771) WORLD PREMIERE RECORDING Valerio Contaldo, tenor (Adamo) Luciana Mancini, mezzo-soprano (Eva) Roberta Mameli, soprano (Angelo di Giustizia) Alice Rossi, soprano (Angelo di Misericordia) Il Gardellino & Peter Van Heyghen, direction
Full of fire, spirit, and life”: this description of the Bohemian composer Josef Mysliveček’s character was made by none other than Wolfgang Amadeus Mozart, his younger contemporary. Mysliveček (1737-1781) spent his entire career in Italy and committed himself to the life of a freelance composer: he obstinately refused to accept any type of employment in permanent service. Not only did he develop into one of the most talented, successful and productive opera and oratorio composers of his time, but he also achieved distinction as a composer of instrumental music. Mysliveček’s style depicts an Italian version of musical classicism that has not yet received full recognition, a style that was gracious, melodious, diatonic, and less experimental in character: a style that remained connected to the transparent and ‘natural’ homophonic idiom that had been developed in Italy during the 1730s and 1740s. An essential characteristic of this style was the rich opportunity it offered for vocal display and virtuosity. We should not seek Mysliveček’s merits in an individual or an innovative musical language; his great artistry lay rather in his mastery of all the forms and techniques current at that time, in the inventiveness revealed in his musical ideas and techniques, and in the ease with which he connected and alternated these ideas in new and often unexpected ways. All of the above are amply illustrated by this world premiere recording of Adamo ed Eva (1771), his third oratorio.
Just like most German composers of his time, Telemann was very well acquainted with the stylistic developments in the other European countries, Italy and France in particular, and in his own compositions he assimilated the various national styles: the Lully Ouverture, the stylized French dances and the Italian trio sonata and concerto. Telemann’s contribution to these forms and genres was...
In the present recording, the organists Liuwe Tamminga and Leo Van Doeselaar have selected eleven double-choir instrumental pieces (from Giovanni Gabrieli. This selection of eight-to-twelve-part pieces, performed on two of the most beautiful and suitable organs for this repertoire—the two magnificent organs of the San Petronio Basilica in Bologna (unfortunately no comparable organs have...
With this disc, Swiss harpsichordist Michel Kiener presents his interpretation of the Goldberg Variations, one of Bach’s absolute masterpieces. Kiener completed both his piano and harpsichord studies at the Geneva Conservatoire, where he won the prize of virtuosity in both disciplines. He perfected his art with Gustav Leonhardt in Amsterdam and was laureate of the Bruges International...
Sebastian Bach composed many works for violin (besides the pieces for organ and harpsichord, the two instruments he mainly played). He had learned to play the violin as a child and knew its characteristics perfectly well. Unfortunately, the manuscripts of many of his compositions were lost after his death: the three sonatas for violin and basso continuo BWV 1021, 1023 and 1024 are today a small...
World Premiere recording of the Six Sonatas for harpsichord with violin accompaniment of Cirri. Ignazio Cirri was maestro di cappella from 1759 at the Cathedral of Santa Croce, now the Duomo in Forlì. In that same year he was granted entrance to the Philharmonic Academy in Bologna. It is not certain whether his teachers included Giovanni Battista Martini who was only five years older. It is...
Through centuries of re-telling the myth of Venus and Adonis, the ritualistic Adonia festival held in ancient Athens has remained a part of the story which fascinated a number of literary figures during the Italian Renaissance. The ritual was both a lamentation of love cruelly stolen by the hands of fate, and a feverish “final dance” with all of life's short-lived pleasures and desires. The...
Josef Mysliveček (1737-1781) Adamo ed Eva Oratorio for four voices (1771) WORLD PREMIERE RECORDING Valerio Contaldo, tenor (Adamo) Luciana Mancini, mezzo-soprano (Eva) Roberta Mameli, soprano (Angelo di Giustizia) Alice Rossi, soprano (Angelo di Misericordia) Il Gardellino & Peter Van Heyghen, direction
