SACDs - Gabrieli, G

While the latter half of the sixteenth century saw the first stirrings of the Baroque, this period also witnessed the creation of the finest cathedrals in sound, with their foundations in the distant Gothic era of music ... Composers vied with each other in daring and ingenuity, presenting works with twelve, sixteen, twenty-four and even, in the case of Tallis’s famous Spem in alium, forty different voices! The Huelgas Ensemble celebrates its thirty-fifth anniversary with a spectacular selection of these works, recorded live without a ‘safety net’.

This year marks the 400th anniversary of the death of one of the most influential musicians of the Venetian School, Giovanni Gabrieli, and this new hybrid SACD presents his ‘La Musica Per San Rocco’. A sequence written in 1608 to celebrate the feast of St. Rocco, it is performed by the vocal group Melodi Cantores and the early music ensemble La Pifarescha. They are directed by organist and conductor Elena Sartori.

Born in Ravenna in Italy, Elena Sartori studied with Daniel Chorzempa at the Musik Akademie of Basel and the Hochschule Mozarteum of Salzburg, and with Helmut Rilling at the Bach Akademie of Stuttgart. She set up the ensemble Melodi Cantores in 2000 in order to make a first reconstruction, performance and recording of Giovanni Battista Martini’s Requiem. Since then the group has been involved in many musical projects, and has become particularly known for performing rarely heard repertoire.

The young Heinrich Schütz’s four-year sojourn with Giovanni Gabrieli proved to be one of the most fruitful educational journeys to Italy undertaken by a German musician. Following his return, Schütz presented his 'Psalms of David' in 1619: an impressive result of his encounter with the Italian musical style. These 'German Psalms in the Italian Manner' are consistently based on the polychoral style with which Schütz had become acquainted in the Venetian tradition of cori spezzati. As first organist of St Mark’s, Venice, Gabrieli included in his compositions the architecture of this ecclesiastical building in a unique way, placing the singers and instrumentalists, who were divided into as many as four choirs, in facing galleries, thus achieving remarkable sonic and spatial effects.

On this recording the Cappella Murensis and the ensemble Les Cornets Noirs make use of the four galleries in the Abbey Church at Muri where the abbots and master builders designed the octagonal nave of specifically for polyphonic effect. In the works for two, three and four choirs, voices and instruments blend with a total of four continuo organs, producing a unique sound. The inclusion of the two large historic Bossart organs (Epistle and Gospel) as continuo instruments creates an additional dynamic palette.

With magnificent Sonatas and Canzonas by Giovanni Gabrieli, Les Cornets Noirs, led by the cornettists Gebhard David and Bork-Frithjof Smith, are showcased as one of the leading European ensembles in early baroque music.

The legendary brass section of the Chicago Symphony Orchestra, long recognised for its power, dynamism and lyricism, takes centre stage in the latest release from the Grammy®-winning CSO Resound label. Cheered for their performances and recordings of Mahler, Bruckner and Strauss, the CSO Brass turns its focus to works by Gabrieli, William Walton and J.S. Bach, as well as symphonic works arranged for brass and percussion by Silvestre Revueltas (Sensemayá) and Prokofi ev (Three Scenes from Romeo and Juliet). Percy Grainger’s Lincolnshire Posy, beloved by generations of wind ensemble devotees, is transcribed here in a stunning arrangement by San Francisco Symphony trombonist, Timothy Higgins. Virtuoso arrangements by Joseph Kreines of three scenes from Prokofiev’s Romeo and Juliet and Walton’s Crown Imperial feature the entire brass ensemble in thrilling fashion.

A musical force in Chicago and around the world, the Chicago Symphony Orchestra is consistently hailed as one of the fi nest international orchestras. Its expansive catalogue of more than 900 recordings has earned 62 Grammy Awards—more than any other orchestra in the world.

“Trumpet Masque” sees renowned trumpeter Jonathan Freeman-Attwood explore his passion for expanding the instrument’s limited chamber repertoire by imaginatively arranging Baroque works previously scored for alternative forces.

In “Trumpet Masque”, Jonathan Freeman-Attwood and Daniel-Ben Pienaar take a radical new look at the 17th century with a compelling vision of repertoire historically far-removed from the traditional contexts of both trumpet and piano.

Through wonderfully vibrant programming and arrangements, this invigorating and warm-hearted chamber duo present music from Dowland to Purcell in an energetic, innovative and 21st century fashion.

The aim of this recording is to open our ears to a period of unequalled variety, colour, regional diversity and expressive freedom: the Venetian world of Gabrieli, the great pre-Bach North German lineage of Buxtehude, Jacobean dances and songs and the great G major sonata from Muffat’s ‘Armonico Tributo’ with its virtuoso and valedictory passacaglia, which appropriately ends the disc.