Monteverdi: Lettera amorosa

This set gathers 2 albums released in 1990 and 1994.

Each of them definitely established Montserrat Figueras as one of the best performers of Claudio Monteverdi’s vocal music. At this time, she developed an innovative style of interpretation, characterised by great fidelity to historical sources, combined with an extraordinary creative and expressive power, that has exerted a decisive influence on the whole historical music movement.

Vocal music before 1800 required a new technical and stylistic approach capable of restoring to the beauty and emotion of the voice, that most human of all forms of expression, the necessary balance between singing and declamation, with an emphasis on the poetic and spiritual dimension of the text.

She is accompanied by Jordi Savall on CD1 and Ton Koopman on CD2.

Cathy Berberian was born in the United States of Armenian parents. While proficient in the traditional concert repertoire, Miss Berberian was renowned for her contribution to contemporary music. Her enormous flexibility and range together with a strong sense of theater and innate musicality have been acclaimed by press and public alike, and have inspired the creation of compositions by major contemporary composers such as Berio, Bussotti, Cage, Milhaud, Maderna, Pousseur, etc. One of the highlights of her career was her musical relationship with Stravinsky who made the final version of the “Elegy for JFK” for her voice and with whom she gave concerts and made Columbia recordings of Stravinsky’s vocal music.