Gabrieli, G: In ecclesiis a 14

A welcome return to Hyperion for Ex Cathedra and Jeffrey Skidmore, whose exuberant recordings of Baroque music from around the world have made them one of the best-loved ensembles of today.

This latest release presents the music of Giovanni Gabrieli in his four-hundredth anniversary year. These magnificent liturgical settings from the heart of the Venetian polychoral tradition are full of drama, wonder and extraordinary spatial effects. His Majestys Sagbutts & Cornetts and Concerto Palatino provide the sonic gilding that would have been an essential part of the original performances, when extra musicians crowded the galleries of St Mark’s for special occasions.

Following their recording of Striggio’s Mass in 40 Parts from 1566, which racked up an astounding array of critical and commercial plaudits, Robert Hollingworth leads his maverick ensemble I Fagiolini on a new journey unearthing incredible lost works from the late Renaissance and early Baroque: 1612. The recording recreates a thanksgiving Vesper in commemoration of the famous Venetian naval victory at Lepanto in 1571, celebrated for over 200 years after the event in a new festival – The Feast of the Holy Rosary.

The title 1612 represents a year of momentous events: the death of the master of the ‘Massive Baroque’ and most brilliant of Venetian multi-choir composers, Giovanni Gabrieli; and thereby the apex of the fashion of multi-choirs. 1612 also marks the publication of Viadana’s collection of 4-choir Vesper Psalms, with a layout considerably more forward-looking than Monteverdi’s psalms in his 1610 publication. 1612 presents the world premiere recordings of Viadana’s Vesper Psalms and Gabrieli’s 28-voice Magnificat, surrounded by lost treasures from the glorious period of multi-choir music.

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.

This collection features composers who were drawn to Venice in the 16th and 17th centuries and includes works such as Vasto mar and Es steh Gott auf by Schütz, who studied with Gabrieli in Venice. This is the second volume in a series of concerts given in the Chapel in Dresden Castle.

Paul McCreesh and the Gabrieli Consort and Players have become famous for their recreations of the great liturgical set pieces of the Venetian 16th and early 17th centuries. These recordings made by Deutsche Grammophon in the 1990s are state of the art and were critically acclaimed. In this 5Cd set we are taken back to St Mark’s Basilica, the most important church in the city-state, and the Confraternity of San Rocco, for which Giovanni Gabrieli and his colleague the falsetto Bartolemeo Barbarino composed remarkable collection of instrumental and vocal music. This recording includes wide range of Gabrieli’s work, from intimate motets, to the reconstructed glory of the 33 part Magnificat On CDs 1 and 2 we are in St Mark’s at Easter time in 1600. The smell of incense hangs in the chill air of the basilica and the huge building resonates with sound of voices – the service has begun. The central work is the Missa Congratulamini mihi by Lassus. As was customary, the Credo has been omitted, and substituted with non-liturgical vocal works by composers such as Giovanni and Alessandro Gabrieli, Bendinelli, and Merulo. Organ toccatas, Sacrae symphonea and other vocal works are placed between the movements of the Mass. The Venetian Vespers on CDs 3 and 4 again draws on music from a variety of composers as services such as the vespers at this time were often made up of movements of Mass and Vespers settings by different composers. The composer of the most famous setting of the Vespers, Claudio Monteverdi features here with his Messa et salmi, alongside Banchieri, Cavalli, and Giovanni Gabrieli.

Gramophone reviewing Music for San Rocco said ‘It is hard to imagine this fine recording of Gabrieli’s music being superseded for some time to come. For the sheer splendour of the music, and the excellence of the performances, this recording is a must, a real five-star achievement’. January 1997

Venetian Vespers Gramophone review ‘Among the performers there is a feeling of common enterprise that is hard to describe, but which sets this record apart from so many others where the overall impression is of a sequence of unrelated pieces given a disjointed series of separate performances…. There is some carefully thought out and gracefully shaped instrumental playing…. In short this is an heroic achievement of the highest possible order’. June 1993

Venetian Easter Mass, Gramophone review. ‘The impact is tremendous in some items…as usual, the singing and playing are of a high order..’ July 1997

A celebration of the pioneering early music label Archiv, offering 55CDs ranged across the label’s entire 66-year history. Beautiful presentation, original jacket sleeves and documentation to the customary high standards of the label.

In more ways than one, 2013 will be an Archiv Produktion year. The beloved Silver Label – the “Early Music Studio of Deutsche Grammophon”, as it was called for many years – is being revived in a big way, both in frontline and catalogue. In early April 2013 an event in Berlin is being held to mark this relaunch. New albums from choral group Tenebrae, Anna Prohaska and Giuliano Carmignola are being released in the first quarter to coincide with this occasion.

Simple, striking and strong: in gleaming silver with the large blue Archiv Logo embossed on all sides. A large onsert on the top and back of the box details contents and is illustrated with a packshot showing contents.

Original Jackets: starting with the austere yellow covers of the 1940s and 1950s gradually giving way to the great historical illustrations and images that featured up to the 1990s, when artists at last began to make an appearance (there were no artist photos in the 1950s!)

The 180-page full-colour book has articles by journalist Nicholas Anderson, and “memoirs” by former directors of Archiv, Prof. Andreas Holschneider and Dr. Peter Czornyj, and Executive Producer, Marita Prohmann.

The book features many rare photos from Archiv recording sessions, as well as other memorabilia.