Monteverdi: Vespro della beata Vergine (1610): filmed at the Chapelle Royale at Versailles

Gardiner's 30-strong choir allows him to shape the psalm movements like richly upholstered madrigals, chiselling out contrasts between very loud and very quiet, varying the pace at will and really... — Gramophone Magazine, February 2016 More…

Release Date: 4th Dec 2015
Catalogue No: ALPHA705
Label: Alpha

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Monteverdi: Vespro della beata Vergine (1610)

Monteverdi Choir & The English Baroque Soloists
Sir John Eliot Gardiner

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In 1610, Monteverdi gave his Vespers for the Virgin in Mantua before conquering the Basilica of Saint Mark in Venice. This was the first great sacred masterpiece of the Baroque. Following the brilliant Orfeo (1607), the Vespers borrow its opening fanfare and positioned Monteverdi as the leading composer of his time.

J. E. Gardiner founded the Monteverdi Choir, one of the world’s finest choruses, specifically for this work, which he conducted for the first time in 1964 and subsequently recorded twice. With the present recording, where the image ideally accompanies the music, J. E. Gardiner wanted to make more perceptible the spatialisation that characterized Venetian music, by using the specific architecture and different levels of the Chapelle Royale at Versailles.

Reviews

February 2016

Gardiner's 30-strong choir allows him to shape the psalm movements like richly upholstered madrigals, chiselling out contrasts between very loud and very quiet, varying the pace at will and really pushing at the text…there are exquisite solos too, especially from soprano Silvia Frigato and tenor Nicholas Mulroy.

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Monteverdi: Vespro della beata Vergine (1610)

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