Rachel Podger, Holland Baroque Society – Antonio Vivaldi – La Cetra (2012)
FLAC (tracks) 24 bit/96 kHz | Time – 01:58:46 minutes | 2,40 GB | Genre: Classical
Studio Masters, Official Digital Download | Front Cover | © Channel Classics
Podger is a dynamic and unfailingly accurate virtuoso with exceptional interpretive instincts that can turn an unimposing rhythmic accent, a tiny melodic figure, or a seemingly routine harmonic progression into a moment of surprise or sheer wonder not only at the technical facility but also at the unexpected expressive effect. These concertos are full of challenges for the soloist, and Podger, who has considerable experience not only with Vivaldi, but with Mozart, Bach, and Haydn, has no apparent fear of any of them. And she also is a confident leader, bringing her very capable orchestral colleagues perfectly along with her, not only concerning tempos, but more importantly into her personal conception of dynamics, her volatile phrasing and often relentless rhythmic thrust. This is what makes these performances so exciting, invigorating, and so memorably different from the Vivaldi we’ve previously known and loved from performers such as Fabio Biondi, Giuliano Carmignola, and Andrew Manze.
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Kati Debretzeni, Orchestra of the Age of Enlightenment – Vivaldi: The Four Seasons (2014)
FLAC (tracks) 24 bit/96 kHz | Time – 41:20 minutes | 787 MB | Genre: Classical
Studio Masters, Official Digital Download | Front Cover | © Signum Records
Antonio Vivaldi’s Four Seasons is one of the most universally recognized and beloved works in western music, and there is no shortage of excellent recordings on the market, in various interpretations and arrangements. This 2014 Signum Classics release by the Orchestra of the Age of Enlightenment belongs to a growing number of historically informed performances, which employ authentic Baroque techniques, original instrumentation, and historically accurate style, in accordance with the best scholarship. Simply put, the renditions on this album have the verve and luster that Vivaldi might have wanted in these picturesque concertos, and the musicians make every effort to re-create the Four Seasons as they would have been heard in the early 18th century. Led by violinist Kati Debretzeni, who plays the spectacular solo part in all four concertos, the performances are bright and energetic, with crisp accentuation and meticulous execution. Special attention is paid to the nature sounds Vivaldi imitated in his score and indicated in the published poetry, with bird calls, rustic clapping and stomping, and other extraordinary effects added to heighten the scene painting. Signum’s recording is close-up but fully dimensional, so there is clear separation between Debretzeni and the ensemble, and every detail is clear.
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Mhairi Lawson, La Serenissima, Adrian Chandler – Vivaldi: L’Amore per Elvira (2006)
FLAC (tracks) 24 bit/88,2 kHz | Time – 01:16:07 minutes | 1,30 GB | Genre: Classical
Studio Masters, Official Digital Download | Front Cover | © Linn Records
L’Amore per Elvira is the title La Serenissima have given this disc, referring to the fact that the three chamber cantatas it includes deal with the ups and downs of love for a lady of that name. Put together they tell a neat little story; the lover timidly declares his feelings; the lover must go on a journey and makes a tearful farewell; the lover returns for a joyous reunion. Each consists of a pair of recitatives and arias, and while the latter are full of the kind of striking and demanding vocal writing we have learnt to expect from Vivaldi, it is the opening recitatives which seem most determined to grab the attention. From the trembling trills at the start of Tremori al braccio or the slightly overwrought Elvira anima mia to the excitable Lungi del vago volto, each sets the mood for its ensuing cantata with memorable boldness and imagination.
Mhairi Lawson brings to them her characteristically bright and powerful tone and strong sense of drama. The three instrumental works which interleave with the cantatas on this disc Adrian Chandler presents with an engaging combination of keen-edged incisiveness and silky tone.
Amid the current welter of Vivaldi recordings, however, there is no doubt that with well programmed and performed releases such as this, La Serenissima are winning an important place for themselves. –Gramophone, January 2007
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Fabio Biondi, Europe Galante – Vivaldi: I concerti dell’addio (2015)
FLAC (tracks) 24 bit/88,2 kHz | Time – 01:19:56 minutes | 1,53 GB | Genre: Classical
Studio Masters, Official Digital Download | Front Cover | © Glossa Area: Italie
Since the early 1990s, Antonio Vivaldi and Fabio Biondi have become inseparable. In his latest recording for Glossa, the latter offers further proof of the astonishing imaginative powers of Vivaldi as a composer of violin concertos, which are matched by Biondi’s own dynamic and cultured virtuosity as violinist (and director). With these ‘Farewell’ Concertos Biondi turns to works written by a Vivaldi very near the end of his life as he travelled to Vienna in a desperate search for creative opportunities.
Where Biondi’s recent ‘Il Diario di Chiara’ release saw a late Vivaldi surrounded by colleagues and successors at the Pietà in Venice, ‘I concerti dell’addio’ sees him in a Vienna in mourning for its recently-deceased emperor and more attuned to the now-fashionable galante style than to that of the Red Priest, however brilliant and ebullient Vivaldi’s compositional spirit continued to be.
The six concertos on this disc are all drawn from a collection sold in 1741 – very cheaply it seems to the count Vinciguerra Collalto – today kept in Brno, and bear witness to Vivaldi’s late style as it headed in the direction of Tartini and Locatelli.
Biondi’s selection of concertos provides him full scope to portray the vivid and masterfully-conceived imagery, a compendium of violin techniques and the opportunities for improvisation implicit in Vivaldi’s maturity.
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Andrew Manze – Vivaldi: Concertos for the Emperor (2006)
FLAC (tracks) 24 bit/88,2 kHz | Time – 01:18:54 minutes | 1,36 GB | Genre: Classical
Studio Masters, Official Digital Download | Front Cover | © harmonia mundi
No, not more Vivaldi Violin Concertos! How can there be any more? Have not decades of scholarships overturned every possible rock to find every possible violin concerto by the composer of The Four Seasons, everybody’s perennial favorite? Although the answer is apparently not, that is, in fact, good news: that there are still more lovely, charming, hilarious, touching, and mind-bogglingly difficult Violin Concertos by Vivaldi should warm the hearts and open the wallets of classical music lovers around the world.
And that is not all the good news. The really good news is that seven more-or-less new Violin Concertos by Vivaldi have been recorded by super-virtuoso Andrew Manze leading the super-fine English Concert. And while none of them, not even the super-sultry L’amoroso, will make most listeners shed their allegiance to Vivaldi’s four greatest hits, all of them are in truth just as lovely, charming, hilarious, touching, and perhaps even more mind-bogglingly difficult Violin Concertos that Manze dispatches with his by now customary panache and aplomb. Yes, more Vivaldi Violin Concertos! Harmonia Mundi’s digital sound is vivid and immediate.
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Dmitry Sinkovsky, Il Pomo d’Oro – Antonio Vivaldi – Concerti per violino V ‘Per Pisendel’ (2013)
FLAC (tracks) 24 bit/96 kHz | Time – 01:17:49 minutes | 1,49 GB | Genre: Classical
Studio Masters, Official Digital Download | Front Cover | © naïve classique
This is the 49th title in the Vivaldi Edition and the 5th volume, out of approximately 12, of the series dedicated to the violin concertos whose manuscripts are held in the National Library of Turin. All the concertos selected here are linked to German violinist Johann Georg Pisendel, member of the Dresden orchestra, who spent time in Venice in 1716-17, with the Electoral Prince of Saxony Friedrich August. Vivaldi and Pisendel became very close friends and the Red Priest composed several works for Pisendel. Moreover, Pisendel copied and performed afterwards in Germany several concertos by Vivaldi.
Composer: Antonio Vivaldi
Performer: Dmitry Sinkovsky
Orchestra/Ensemble: Il Pomo D’oro
Giuliano Carmignola, Amandine Beyer, Gli incogniti – Vivaldi: Concerti per due violini (2016)
FLAC (tracks) 24 bit/88,2 kHz | Time – 01:10:03 minutes | 1,29 GB | Genre: Classical
Studio Masters, Official Digital Download | Front Cover | © harmonia mundi
Vivaldi’s double concertos resemble jousts: ‘the standards are raised, the bystanders comment, analyse, compare, speculate, the betting counter is open’, writes Olivier Fourés. But, he continues, the joust is not for real. It is ‘the stage of a theatre where two solitudes, within a group, meet up, then both size each other up and comfort each other’. There is bound to be comparison between the two protagonists, but in the end the triumph will be collective. And the least one can say is that Amandine Beyer and her illustrious guest Giuliano Carmignola have breathed new life into this dazzling form of musical theatre!
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Marco Ceccato, Accademia Ottoboni – Vivaldi: Cello Sonatas (2014)
FLAC (tracks) 24 bit/88,2 kHz | Time – 01:15:09 minutes | 1,27 GB | Genre: Classical
Studio Masters, Official Digital Download | Front Cover | © Zig-Zag Territoires
Vivaldi’s Opus 14 Sonatas are part of the cello’s ‘great repertoire and also some of the works from the last years of the ‘Red Priest’. Quite simply – and regardless of Igor Stravinsky’s curiously rash judgement regarding Vivaldi’s work –, these sonatas are splendid, making this instrument sound as only a composer who is an experienced virtuoso instrumentalist himself – in this case, a violinist – can do.
Marco Ceccato is one of the members most often noticed of Amandine Beyer’s ensemble, Gli Ingogniti, (‘…Cellist Marco Ceccato is equally impressive,’ Gramophone, March 2013). Zig Zag Territoires wanted to devote this recording to him, convinced of his great talent and of the singularity of his sound imagination.
Jean-Guihen Queyras – Vivaldi: Cello Concertos (2011)
FLAC (tracks) 24 bit/44,1 kHz | Time – 01:08:32 minutes | 706 MB | Genre: Classical
Studio Masters, Official Digital Download | Front Cover | © harmonia mundi
Among his many famous and beloved concertos, Vivaldi wrote no fewer than twenty-seven for the cello an instrument that at the time was generally consigned to playing basso continuo. With the genuine virtuosi he had available to him at the Ospedale della Pietà, the Prete Rosso played a key role in the emancipation of the cello. On this new CD of Vivaldi concertos, acclaimed cellist Jean-Guihen Queyras is supported by the musicians of the Akademie für Alte Musik Berlin in a fascinating program that is further enhanced by a selection of highly expressive Sinfonias by Antonio Caldara.
Composer: Antonio Vivaldi, Antonio Caldara
Performer: Jean-Guihen Queyras
Conductor: Georg Kallweit
Orchestra/Ensemble: Academy for Ancient Music Berlin
Vittorio Grigolo – The Romantic Hero (2014)
FLAC (tracks) 24 bit/96 kHz | Time – 57:29 minutes | 1,13 GB | Genre: Classical
Studio Masters, Official Digital Download | Front Cover | © Sony Classical
Established as one of the world’s leading Italian tenors, an integral vehicle in Vittorio’s operatic trajectory has been French opera. His extraordinary international breakthrough came in the role of Des Grieux in Massenet’s Manon alongside Anna Netrebko at the Royal Opera House in 2010. He astounded the audience and critics:
‘The birth of a star’ – EVENING STANDARD
‘The most sensational debut to be heard at Covent Garden for some time’ – THE GUARDIAN
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Vittorio Grigolo – Ave Maria (2013)
FLAC (tracks) 24 bit/48 kHz | Time – 01:00:45 minutes | 643 MB | Genre: Classical
Studio Masters, Official Digital Download | Front Cover | © Sony Classical
Italian tenor Vittorio Grigòlo has been touted as the next Pavarotti, or perhaps as the next Andrea Bocelli. Neither description is really apposite. He has nowhere near the musicality of Pavarotti, but what he does have, unlike Bocelli, is power in reserve. Grigòlo has aimed his music squarely at the large crossover segment of the British classical market, and he has experienced rapidly ballooning success. Here, he moves mostly to the classical side with a well-worn selection of short sacred pieces. There’s nothing here to dismay the followers Grigòlo has accumulated so far with the likes of his recording of West Side Story with Hayley Westenra (to whose fans this release is heartily recommended), but he does get to stretch his voice out a bit. The results are mixed. The sound does not vary much from piece to piece, from text to text, or even from phrase to phrase, but there is no question that it’s a voice that’s enjoyable to hear. It promptly enters the head register and stays there, resulting in a sound that loses none of its pure power while adding a bit of resonance and just a hint of noise. There is every chance that you will fall in love with Grigòlo on first hearing him, although there are plenty of singers who can do more even within the relatively restricted set of materials he gets to work with here. By all means, if you’re hooked on Grigòlo, pick the available deluxe version of this release, which includes Schubert’s Ave Maria (one might have thought this a natural for the standard version, but perhaps the intent was to push the faithful toward the higher profit margin), along with full lyrics.
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Vittorio Ghielmi – Le secret de Monsieur Marais (2020)
FLAC (tracks) 24 bit/96 kHz | Time – 01:07:38 minutes | 1,23 GB | Genre: Classical
Studio Masters, Official Digital Download | Front Cover | © Alpha Classics
Between 1680 and 1728, Marin Marais brought the ‘pièce de viole’ to the peak of perfection. An ‘unremitting’ teacher, he was also the publisher of his own music and invented special signs to notate certain ornaments for the viol. In the course of his research at the Salzburg Mozarteum, the Italian gambist Vittorio Ghielmi studied these manuscript codes, in the hand of Marais himself or his direct students. ‘This led me to a new vision of French Baroque music, which applies not only to the viola da gamba, but also to vocal and orchestral music. These signs reveal the technique of playing in action. Contrary to the static descriptions of the treatises of the time, one has the impression of seeing didactic “videos”’.
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Vittorio Ghielmi – Forqueray Le Diable – Complete Pieces de Viole (2014)
FLAC (tracks) 24 bit/48 kHz | Time – 01:00:20 minutes | 688 MB | Genre: Classical
Studio Masters, Official Digital Download | Front Cover | © Passacaille
About the less than 40 extant compositions of father Antoine Forqueray (1672-1745) and his son Jean-Baptiste Antoine (1699-1782), scholars remain divided as to whom proper attribution belongs. One thing however, is certain: their music is of outstanding quality. Few others understood so well the expressive possibilities of the 7-string viol. The Forquerays, like all great artists, carry their music to the limit and explore all its facets. This is music that is, like all truly great music, completely “different”; an incomparable legacy dedicated to the expressivity of the viola da gamba.
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Vittorio Forte – Earl Wild: [Re]Visions – Piano Transcriptions (2021)
FLAC (tracks) 24 bit/96 kHz | Time – 01:17:31 minutes | 1,01 GB | Genre: Classical
Studio Masters, Official Digital Download | Front Cover | © Odradek Records
Following the success of his Odradek debut, ‘Abschied’ (keyboard works by C.P.E. Bach), pianist Vittorio Forte pays tribute to one of his musical heroes, Earl Wild, whose transcriptions are, in Forte’s words, “a revelation”.
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