PER LA VERGINE MARIA

Works by Monteverdi, Bencini, Soler, Melani etc.

1. Claudio Monteverdi: Litanie della beata vergine a 6 voci

2. Pietro Paolo Bencini: Magnificat a 8 voci, Magnificat – Largo

3. Quia respexit

4. Quia fecit mihi magna

5. Et misericordia ejus – Cantabile

6. Fecit potentiam

7. Deposuit potentes

8. Esurientes

9. Suscepit Israel

10. Sicut locutus est

11. Alessandro Melani: Salve regina a 9 voci

12. Padre Antonio Soler: Magnificat a 8 voci, Magnificat – Largo majestuoso

13. Et exultavit – Andante

14. Et misericordia – Largo

15. Fecit potentiam – Andante

16. Gloria Patri – Largo

17. Sicut erat – Andante

18. Alessandro Scarlatti: Salve regina a 4 voci, Largo

19. Giacomo Carissimi: Magnificat a 8 voci

20. Igor Stravinsky: Ave maria a 4 voci

Monica Piccinini, Lia Serafini, Anna Simboli (soprano),

Elena Biscuola, Gabriella Martellacci (contralto),

Maurizio Dalena, Raffaele Giordani (tenor),

Matteo Bellotto, Marco Scavazza (bass),

Ugo di Giovanni, Franco Pavan (theorbos),

Francesco Moi (organ)

Concerto Italiano / Rinaldo Alessandrini

The renowned combination of conductor Rinaldo Alessandrini and Concerto Italiano new CD of sacred choral music features the first recording of Melani’s Salve Regina, as well as settings by Monteverdi, Bencini, Alessandro Scarlatti, Soler, Carissimi, and Stravinsky.

Melani’s ‘Salve Regina’, which has been transcribed from a manuscript held in the archives of the basilica of Santa Maria Maggiore, was part of the repertory of the private chapel founded by the Borghese family in 1615, of which Melani was director of music from 1672 until the year of his death. The ‘Salve Regina’ of Alessandro Scarlatti was written in Rome in 1703 and probably performed at the basilica of San Lorenzo in Damaso, an annexe of the Palazzo della Cancelleria. Claudio Monteverdi’s ‘Litanie della Beata Vergine’ form part of the edition of the Mass for four voices and Psalms published in Venice in 1650 after the composer’s death. Two of the three Magnificat settings presented on this disc were composed in Rome over a period of almost a century. The first is by Giacomo Carissimi who taught at the Jesuit Collegio Germanico-Ungarico of Rome and was maestro di cappella of the basilica of Sant’Apollinare. Pier Paulo Bencini’s Magnificat was written around 1745 whilst he was director of the Cappella Giulia at St Peter’s. The Spanish composer Antonio Soler composed his setting in 1770. Igor Stravinsky set the first version of his Ave Maria to a Russian text in 1934, but the version in Latin presented here dates from 1949.

Under Rinaldo Alessandrini’s directorship, Concerto Italiano’s revelatory interpretations have revolutionised our perception of 17th and 18th century Italian music. The group’s groundbreaking recordings of Monteverdi’s madrigals have achieved benchmark status, and established it as the finest ensemble of its kind in Italy today.

Naive OP30505