Lea Desandre / Thomas Dunford / Jupiter AMAZONE

 

AMAZONE

Ensemble Il Caravaggio / Camille Delaforge / Anna Reinhold / Guilhem Worms MADONNA DELLA GRAZIA

 

MADONNA DELLA GRAZIA

Sonya Yoncheva / Cappella Mediterranea REBIRTH

 

REBIRTH

 

Ensemble Correspondances / Sébastien Daucé MARC-ANTOINE CHARPENTIER Messe à quatre chœurs

 

MESSE À QUATRE CHOEURS

 

Jakub Józef Orliński / Il Pomo D'Oro / Maxim Emelyanychev FACCE D'AMORE

                                                             FACCE D'AMORE

Philippe Jaroussky OMBRA MAI FU

“Beyond the great musical interest that Cavalli offers, his operas are notable for their richness and modernity, and for the diversity and complexity of their characters,” says countertenor Philippe Jaroussky. “Stage directors and opera houses are increasingly keen to stage his works. His operas are full of fantasy, craziness, humour and emotion. They offer a variety we don’t find in the opera seria of the 18th century.”

Francesco Cavalli (1602–76) is an important figure in the history of opera and his works, which first experienced a revival in the 1960s, have been growing in currency in recent years. The most prominent successor to Monteverdi, Cavalli was active in Venice at a time when opera was moving out of aristocratic palaces and into public theatres. Musically, his operas are notable for the fluid expression of their recitar cantando (“acting in song”), and dramatically for their variety of tone, combining noble, mythical or tragic drama with teasing or bawdy comedy.

As Philippe Jaroussky explains: “Cavalli played a major role in establishing opera – the new genre created by Monteverdi and others – as popular entertainment. He composed many operas for the Teatro San Cassiano, which was the first theatre in Venice to stage opera.” 

Cavalli was also active in the field of religious music. As a boy, he had sung under Monteverdi’s direction in the choir of St Mark’s Basilica. He went on to become the cathedral’s organist and eventually, in 1668, to follow in Monteverdi’s footsteps and become its maestro di cappella, the equivalent of a modern-day music director.

When preparing this album, Ombra mai fù, Jaroussky was able to study the manuscripts of most of Cavalli’s 37 surviving operas. “I really wanted to use the album’s playing time to show all the variety and all the qualities of Cavalli’s music. It can sometimes appear disarmingly simple, but it has a very special and distinctive melodic and harmonic flavour. The album is designed to illustrate the contrasts in his operas as they move from one scene to the next, where a lamento might be directly followed by something very humorous.”

Jaroussky has included vocal and instrumental numbers from more than a dozen of Cavalli’s operas, ranging from comparatively well-known works such as Calisto, Ercole amante, Ormindo and Giasone through Eliogabalo, which was recently staged in both Paris and Amsterdam, to such rarities as Statira, principessa di Persia and La virtù dei strali d'Amore. He is joined for the love duets by soprano Emőke Baráth (whose recent Erato recital, Voglio cantar, highlighted the music of Barbara Strozzi, a student of Cavalli) and contralto Marie-Nicole Lemieux, who spars with him in the comical duet ‘Ninfa bella’ from Calisto. 

The title track is taken from the opera Xerse, which dates from 1654 and is set to the same libretto that Handel used for his Serse more than 80 years later. Outside the world of opera, Handel’s version of Emperor Xerxes’ ode to a plane tree is known simply as ‘Handel’s Largo’. Cavalli’s version, while less famous and less dignified, is more graceful and lilting. 

“Curiously there are similarities between Cavalli’s and Handel’s settings of Ombra mai fù,” explains Philippe Jaroussky. "Both are quite short and in triple time. Did Handel knew Cavalli’s Xerse? It’s a possibility. An interesting difference between the two arias is that in Handel’s version the first violin plays along with the voice. In Cavalli’s version the violin parts are higher and fill in the harmonies, changing constantly and creating a very beautiful effect of iridescence and colour.” On this recording those violins belong to Ensemble Artaserse, which Jaroussky launched in 2002 in collaboration with other leading musicians in the field of Baroque music.

Emőke Baráth, Il Pomo d'Oro, Francesco Corti VOGLIO CANTAR

The Venetian singer and composer Barbara Strozzi (1619-1677) was probably the most remarkable, talented, famous and successful woman of her times in the field of music. In 2019 we will celebrate its 400th anniversary with a new program performed by soprano Emöke Baráth under the direction of Francesco Corti.

The album, Voglio Cantar, present some of her most beautiful compositions for soprano, some works by her teacher Francesco Cavalli, and a delightful variety of contemporary instrumental pieces.

Barbara Strozzi grew up in a household frequented by illustrious intellectuals. In the year 1637 her father founded an academy exclusively focused on music, the ‚accademia degli unisoni’ – which was not only hosted and presided over by Barbara, but also became her stage to perform her own music. She received her musical education from Francesco Cavalli, who then worked in various important musical positions in Venice and was about to launch his career as an opera composer.

Barbara Strozzi published a significant number of music: 8 volumes of madrigals, arias, ariettas, canzoni – including one volume of sacred music. Most of the compositions are focused on the soprano voice, displaying its pure beauty in lyrical melodies. The only painted (supposed) portrait of Barbara Strozzi shows her as a musician in quite a lascivious pose, presenting the then typical association of female musician and courtesan. Barbara Strozzi died in Padova in the year 1677 under unknown circumstances.

Sébastien Daucé / Ensemble Correspondances BALLET ROYAL DE LA NUIT

The celebrated Ballet Royal de la Nuit, danced by His Majesty Louis XIV at the age of fifteen, was performed early in 1653 on seven evenings in the Salle du Petit-Bourbon at the Louvre Palace. It enjoyed general success: the aristocracy, present in large numbers, the ambassadors of Europe, but also the bourgeois of the city of Paris acclaimed this lavish spectacle whose enchantments made a lasting impression. To make a lasting impression: that was precisely the grand project of Mazarin, who had just returned to power after the disturbances of the Fronde rebellion. Commissioned by the cardinal in person, this ballet project had been conceived at the highest levels of state as a promotional tool for royal power: the intention was to impose respect on the high-ranking personages of the kingdom, to impress the Parisians who were present, and to disseminate this message elsewhere in the world through the intermediary of the foreign representations. If today’s historians are in agreement that the Ballet Royal de la Nuit was one of the key spectacles of Louis XIV’s reign, it is because it was influential in numerous respects: political, institutional, aesthetic and musical. For the first time in the history of the genre, the libretto is unified and skilfully laid out in four veilles (the watches of the night) and a concluding grand ballet; all the levels of interpretation and all the arts move towards a single goal: the rising of the Sun.

Francesca Aspromonte / Il Pomo D'Oro / Enrico Onofri PROLOGUE

The prologue is a unique feature of early baroque opera: an opening scene where an allegorical figure enters the stage to prepare the audience for the musical drama to come. Thus Prologue is the musical introduction of Italian star soprano Francesca Aspromonte and her exclusive, long term engagement with Pentatone, promising great joy as well as drama in the years to come.

Prologue is a highly original album consisting of several prologues from early-baroque operas by Monteverdi, Caccini, Cavalli, Landi, Rossi, Cesti, Stradella and Scarlatti. Strung together, they form a representation in a single act, a theatre full of small, complete dramas: the opera before the opera.

Francesca Aspromonte is quickly establishing herself as a shining star in the Baroque firmament. She has curated this album together with musical director Enrico Onofri, who leads il pomo d’oro, one of the most important and successful period ensembles of today.

Filippo Mineccia / Nereydas / Javier Ulises Illán SIFACE

With Siface: l’amor castrato, countertenor Filippo Mineccia, together with Javier Ulises Illán and Nereydas, presents a short imaginary pasticcio opera reflecting the music-making and life of the contralto castrato known by that stage name. Born Giovanni Francesco Grossi in 1653 in the Grand Duchy of Tuscany, Siface was acclaimed for his exciting musical performances, yet who became famous also for the tragedy of his love life. He was called upon to sing in operas and oratorios by the likes of Stradella, Pasquini, Bassani, Pallavicino and Agostini. For a long time in the service of Francesco II d’Este in Modena, Siface was an active member of the musical “ducal circuit” in the Italian peninsula, even, on one occasion, additionally being sent to England, where he performed before monarchy, and met and impressed Henry Purcell.

Filippo Mineccia brilliantly captures the kaleidoscopic rush of emotions coursing through this selection of arias, which reflects the torrid and spectacular musical pace of life in late seventeenth-century Italy (as well as mirroring Siface’s own downfall on the road from Ferrara to Bologna).

The Spanish ensemble Nereydas fully enter into the spirit of this, by turns, colourful, heartfelt, poignant and vivid celebration of vocal and instrumental music, which also features works by Alessandro Scarlatti (the emotive lullaby Dormi o fulmine), Francesco Cavalli and Purcell (My song shall be alway). Elena Bernardi puts flesh on still little understood aspects of the early stages of opera in the late Seicento. (Glossa)

Nathalie Stutzmann / Orfeo 55 QUELLA FIAMMA

The Arie Antiche compiled by Alessandro Parisotti are known to each and every student of classical singing. But with Quella fiamma, Nathalie Stutzmann and Orfeo 55 breathe new fire into this primer for the voice, performing these songs and arias with original orchestrations, as they would have been heard in their day. Before they were lessons, they were high art.

This album is a selection of pieces from Arie antiche, a 19th Century collection of songs edited by Alessandro Parisotti to be a vocal primer. Though now more famous as the editor of Arie antiche, Parisotti was also a composer, and he managed to slip one of his own works into the book by attributing to Giovanni Pergolesi his song "Se tu m'ami". The collection was very much a part of the trend to rediscover old and forgotten works, and the popularity of the three-volume set has endured to this day. 

For this album the musicians of Orfeo 55 have worked painstakingly to source original scores and to edit the parts as necessary. While the instrumental works are not part of Parisotti’s primer, they provide brief musical interludes between the songs to enhance the overall listening experience and bring these works together into a coherent programme.

Musica Fiorita / Daniela Dolci DOMENICO ZANATTA Venezia

Little is known about the life of Domenico Zanatta. He was most probably born in Venice as the title pages of his prints seem to attest. The very sparse notices on his early life indicate that he soon started a musical career, already printing his first collection of sonatas at the young age of 24. But he also had a second endeavor: His group of cantatas. Zanatta shows a great mastery of the genre and his melodic inventiveness freely flows between the structuring parts of his cantatas, continuing the tradition of his Venetian colleagues in a much worthy way. Flavio Ferri-Benedetti and Musica Fiorita, under Daniela Dolci, present some of his pieces in between works by Cavalli, Strozzi, who was a pupil of Cavalli, and Fontana, who was a pioneer of the, at the beginning of the 17th century, new stile recitativo. (Arkiv Music)

La Venexiana / Claudio Cavina FRANCESCO CAVALLI Artemisia

Where next for Claudio Cavina and La Venexiana after their exhilarating run of recordings of Monteverdi madrigals, operas and much more? One route is proving to be in the direction of Francesco Cavalli, the 17th century composer who spent much of his working life in Venice, starting off as a chorister in St Mark ’s Basilica when Monteverdi himself was in charge.

Although Cavalli has been known as a composer of Venetian seicento sacred music, it is his prolific contribution in the field of opera – where he became one of the leading figures involved in the development of commercial opera companies from the 1640s onwards – that has been receiving greater attention from artists in more recent times. And it is with a dramma per musica in Artemisia from the mid 1650s, with its tale of love, deceit and honour and the upholding of the virtues of the Venetian Republic (all this richly captured by the expressive style of Cavalli), that Cavina has chosen to contribute to that fresh look at Cavalli’s music on this new recording from Glossa.

Singers in the established style of La Venexiana, including the vocal star of ’Round M, Roberta Mameli and a recent finalist in the Handel Singing Competition in London in Francesca Lombardi Mazzulli (who takes the role of the love-torn Queen Artemisia, a character strong enough to drink her dead husband’s ashes...) give vent to this glorious display of Venetian operatic splendour. (GLOSSA)

La Venexiana / Claudio Cavina FRANCESCO CAVALLI Sospiri d'amore

Two of the brightest singing talents to have emerged from Italy in recent years, Giulia Semenzato and Raffaele Pe, join forces for Sospiri d’amore, a dazzling celebration of operatic arias and duets by that Baroque master of amorous emotions, Francesco Cavalli. Soprano and countertenor are supported by a modern master of Italian Baroque style in Claudio Cavina, who directs La Venexiana (Cavina has also led the Glossa recording of Cavalli’s 1656 opera Artemisia).

Working in Venice with some of the best Italian librettists around in the mid-seventeenth century, Cavalli mined rich emotional seams concerning love in his operas – from tragedy to comedy, from profundity to frivolousness, through to sensuality and vivacity – conjuring up a stream of productions which enjoyed great artistic and financial success; his influence travelled far and wide, and even just in the immediate period of the Baroque this included Rameau, Lully and Handel and Purcell.

With five full-scale duets amongst the solo arias, ariosos and recitar cantando, this new Glossa recording gloriously shows off the talents of two artists who have been gathering important stage experience in the operas of Cavalli: the Venetian Semenzato and the Lombard Pe (who made his debut on the label with The Medici Castrato). Space is also found for one of the vocal genres which Cavalli can lay claim to instigating – the dramatic lamento, here in the form of Lassa, che fò from Statira. In addition, an intriguing picture of Cavalli and his operatic inspiration is to be found in the booklet essay written by Olivier Lexa. (GLOSSA)

Capella de'Turchini / Antonio Florio CAVALLI Statira

Though it has its flaws, this is a hugely important issue that adds immeasurably to our understanding of Pietro Francesco Cavalli, the dominant Italian opera composer of the second half of the 17th century. His music fell out of fashion after his death, and its rediscovery, which began with Glyndebourne's productions of L'Ormindo and La Calisto in the 1960s, has been a slow process. This recording of Statira, first performed in Venice in 1656, cannot help but change our views of his output as a whole, since it reveals a dark side to Cavalli hitherto ignored.

It begins in familiar territory. The plot is rooted in one of those complex, cross-dressing tangles - quintessentially Cavalli - complete with an emphasis on bisexuality as fundamental to human nature, something that made the composer unperformable for centuries. Statira, daughter of King Darius of Persia, is in love with Cloridaspe, king of Arabia. There are, of course, complications. Usimano, an Egyptian prince, is also besotted with Statira; in order to pursue her, he has disguised himself as a woman and is now employed as her lady-in-waiting. "Ermosilla", as he calls himself, attracts men like a magnet, including Cloridaspe's brutal sidekick Nicarco and his manservant Vaffrino.

Anyone expecting this situation to resolve itself serenely after the fashion of Calisto, however, is in for a shock, for the opera's subject is actually the relationship between sex and war. The men are members of a military alliance that is in the process of flattening Armenia. whether it holds or not depends on the shifting sexual allegiances back home. Once Usimano's guise has been penetrated, Statira becomes a bargaining tool between themen, who demand her favours in exchange for military service to her father. A conventionally happy ending doesn't alleviate the resultant nastiness.

Stylistically, the score blends familiar Cavalli with startlingly new elements. Cloridaspe and Usimano are both played by women, which means there are plenty of his sexy trademark duets for twining female voices. Instead of advancing the action with extended recitative dialogues as in La Calisto, however, Statira often proceeds by way of successive monologues that swing from recitative to arioso and back. As Statira becomes a pawn in a man's world, her growing anguish is mirrored in arias of ever-increasing size and difficulty. Cavalli is frequently cited as the link between Monteverdi and Handel; his pivotal nature has never been more apparent than here.

Conducting his own Naples-based period band, the Cappella de' Turchini, Antonio Florio's performance has great clout. Cavalli never wrote out the orchestration in full - in the 17th century, much of it would have been improvised in performance - and this performing edition is Florio's own. It's very stark, with dry strings and sparsely deployed woodwind and brass, far removed from the smoothness of Raymond Leppard's editions or the jazzy flamboyance of René Jacobs.

The singing, however, is uneven. Clarity of diction sometimes takes precedence over beauty of line. Dionisia di Vico's Cloridaspe reveals some ungainly register breaks, and Giuseppe Naviglio's Nicarco isn't quite dangerous enough. On the plus side, however, there's Rosario Totaro's funny, cynical Vaffrino, Maria Ercolano's complex, vibrant Usimano and, above all, Roberta Invernizzi's Statira, miraculously fusing sound with sense in even the most taxing bravura passages. This is a restoration of a lost masterpiece by one of opera's greats, and you need to hear it. (Tim Ashley / The Guardian)

Anna Prohaska / Il Giardino Armonico / Giovanni Antonini SERPENT & FIRE

The German soprano Anna Prohaska joins Alpha Classics for several recording projects. Her first recital brings together two superb African queens - Dido and Cleopatra - and follows them all over Europe during the first century of opera, from the 1640s to 1740. A firework display of arias, virtuosic and tragic by turns, written by the leading personalities of Baroque music ( Cavalli, Handel, Purcell, Hasse) and composers still awaiting rediscovery such as Sartorio, Graupner and the Venetian Castrovillari. For this programme built like a tragedy around the queens of Egypt anda Carthage, whom she interprets with the passion and fervour that have made her reputation, Anna Prohaska is accompanied by one of today's finest Baroque ensembles, Il Giardino Armonico; under the inspired guidance of their director Giovanni Antonini (who is also a dazzling recorder soloist in some of the arias), they keep us on the edge of our seats from start to finish.

A top star in Germany, Anna Prohaska also sings on the world's leading opratic stages, from La Scala to Covent Garden by way of Aix-en-Provence and Salzburg.

Anne Sofie von Otter / Sandrine Piau / Cappella Mediterranea / Leonardo García Alarcón SOGNO BAROCCO

Mezzo-soprano Anne Sofie von Otter is an artist who continues to amaze with the undiminished luster and beauty of her voice, the depth and daring of her interpretation, and her commitment to exploring unfamiliar repertoire. Sogno Barocco is a recital of Italian songs, scenas, and operatic solos and duets drawn from the early to middle Baroque era. It's a mix of familiar pieces like Monteverdi's solo madrigal Si dolce è'l tormento, and "Pur ti miro" from L'incoronazione di Poppea and some real rarities (not to say oddities) such as Luigi Rossi's eccentric, starkly dramatic Lamento della regina di suezia, and Francesco Provenzale's even stranger, highly entertaining parody of it, Squarciato appena havea. Von Otter brings a lifetime of experience and probing intelligence to this intensely expressive repertoire, yet her voice is youthfully fresh and radiant, making for performances of unusual depth and vocal loveliness. Her dramatic sensibility in these pieces, many of which are laments, is focused and subtle (except in the over-the-top comedy of the Provenzale, in which she cuts loose with abandon). Soprano Sandrine Piau joins her in three duets and their voices blend beautifully, especially in sensuality of "Pur ti miro" and the intimate urgency of "Signor, hoggi rinasco," also from Poppea.

Leonardo García Alarcón demonstrates exceptional insight into the music of the early and middle Baroque and further cements his reputation as one of the brightest stars in this repertoire to emerge in the second decade of the 21st century. He and Cappella Mediterranea opt for a spare, lean approach to the realization of the accompaniment, and while it is not the only possible interpretation, it works wonderfully well. It is understated but always inventive, and the ensemble is varied and colorful. Naïve's sound is characteristically immaculate, detailed, and realistic, with plenty of warmth. Highly recommended for fans of vocal music of the Baroque. (Stephen Eddins)

Stephanie D'Oustrac / Amarillis / Héloïse Gaillard / Violaine Cochard FERVEUR & EXTASE

Stéphanie d'Oustrac (born 1974 in Rennes) in is a French mezzo-soprano. Before she had even won a prize a the Conservatoire National Supérieur de Lyon, William Christie offered her the leading role - Medea - in ‘Lully's Thésée’, at the Académie d'Ambronay in 1998. Her carrier leads her to the Opéra Bastille were she performs ‘Carmen, Bizet’. In 2012, Stéphanie d’Oustrac sung in ‘Roméo & Juliette, Berlioz’ at the Opéra Bastille.Her talent leads her to many great mezzo roles of baroque and classical opera. She also worked with great directors such Laurent Pelly , Robert Carsen , Vincent Vittoz , and famous conductors as Myung Wung Chung, John Eliot Gardiner and René Jacobs.

raised for her sensitivity as a musician and for her talents as a virtuoso, Héloïse Gaillard soon made a name for herself as a soloist. She plays with several excellent ensembles: first oboe with Le Concert Spirituel (Hervé Niquet), first recorder with Les Talens Lyriques (Christophe Rousset), recorder and oboe with Le Concert d'Astrée (Emmanuelle Haïm), as well as regular appearances with Les Arts florissants (William Christie).

Héloïse Gaillard studied at the Conservatoire (CNR) in Tours, where she was awarded first prizes for recorder and modern oboe, before going on to the Rotterdam academy, where she gained her soloist's diploma (recorder) with distinction, the Lemmensinstitut in Louvain, where she obtained a first-prize with distinction, and the Paris Conservatoire (CNSM), where she was awarded her higher diploma (Baroque oboe). She has worked with Jean-Pierre Nicolas, Han Tol, Paul Dombrecht and Marcel Ponseele. And she also has a degree in musicology from the Sorbonne and was awarded in 2005 the Certificate d'Aptitude to be a director of an early music department. She teaches baroque oboe at the Aix en Provence academy in the baroque department since 2009.
Baroque music is a passion in which she indulges above all as a member of Amarillis, with which she performs the solo recorder and oboe repertoires, as well as chamber works. The international press has praised the precision, dynamism and subtlety of her playing. France Musiques, the BBC and Mezzo have broadcast several of her concerts.
Héloïse Gaillard appears as a soloist or with orchestras in France and other countries: in Paris (Salle Gaveau, Théâtre des Champs-Élysées, Cité de la musique), Metz (Arsenal), Nantes (Palais des Congrès), at numerous festivals (including Folle journée in Nantes, Sablé-sur-Sarthe, Beaune and Ambronay...), London (Barbican), Madrid, Seville, Granada, Amsterdam (Opera House, Concertgebouw), Dresden and Leipzig (Opera), Berlin (Philharmonic hall), Stockholm (Konzerthuis), Boston, New York (Lincoln Center), Latin America, Russia, India, China, Japan...
 

L'Arpeggiata / Christina Pluhar FRANCESCO CAVALLI L'Amore Innamorato

With L’Amore innamorato – ‘Love in love’ – Christina Pluhar and L’Arpeggiata return to their own first great love, Italian music of the 17th century, and specifically to composer Francesco Cavalli (1602-1676).

A luminary of the glamorous and innovative world of Venetian opera, Cavalli was a protégé of Claudio Monteverdi – the composer around whom L’Arpeggiata built Il teatro d’amore, the ensemble’s first Warner Classics album, which was released in early 2009. “Cavalli’s music excites my passions”, says Christina Pluhar. He composed some 40 operas, some of which have achieved new currency since the 1960s, such as La Calisto, Il Giasone, L’Egisto and L’Ormindo and La Didone. Arias and instrumental numbers from six of his operas feature in L’Amore innamorato. The instrumentalists of L’Arpeggiata are joined for the album – which also includes pieces by two of Cavalli’s contemporaries, Girolamo Kapsperger and Andrea Falconieri – by two sopranos, the Catalan Núria Rial and the Czech Hana Blažíková.

While L’Arpeggiata’s recent Warner Classics CDs – Music for a While, Mediterraneo, Los Pájaros perdidos and Via Crucis – have explored fusions of cultures and musical styles, L’Amore innamorato adheres to the conventions of historically informed performance of Baroque music. The members of the ensemble use stringed, keyboard, wind and percussion instruments to flesh out Cavalli’s score, which comprises only a vocal line, basso continuo and indications for the ritornello (a recurring instrumental section). As Christina Pluhar points out, the line-up of instruments is unusually lavish: she herself performs on theorbo and harp and is joined by the other players who create a sumptuous soundworld, accompanying arias for goddesses and nymphs with a fascinating array of instruments: cornetto, violin, archlute, guitar, harp, psaltery, viola da gamba, lirone, cello, violone, double bass, organ, harpsichord and percussion.

In April 2015, after L’Arpeggiata performed L’Amore innamorato at Carnegie Hall, The New York Times wrote:

“In some ways, L’Arpeggiata represents the state of the art in early-music practice … The most compelling performers today have come to realize how much was left unsaid by composers in scores prepared on the run for use by performing colleagues who were, if not immediately at hand, at least immersed in the style of the period and locale. These performers see conjecture not as a worrisome chore but as an opportunity; improvisation as a matter of course; invention as a necessity.

L’Arpeggiata showed those traits in abundance in a delightful program on Tuesday, L’Amore innamorato: Arias by Francesco Cavalli … Núria Rial, a splendid Spanish soprano, sang numbers from operas including Calisto, Didone and Ormindo beautifully, and the ensemble filled out the 75-minute program with instrumental ditties by Cavalli and others.

The selections tended toward works with variations above repeating bass figures, which come as catnip to these players, inviting, as they do, the extemporization of new variations. Such forms are widespread in the Italian Baroque literature.

Cavalli’s operas have been gaining fitful exposure in recent years … Still, his music is not well known, and it was good to hear these delicious samples in something like their original form. Christina Pluhar, L’Arpeggiata’s artistic director, played theorbo throughout, giving a wonderful, firm basis to the sound.” (Presto Classical)