Tag: Andrea Falconieri

Musical revolutions: Dawn Of The Cantata, Academy Of Ancient Music, Wigmore Hall, 26 April 2012

I got more out of this concert than Janie did, for reasons the following text and vids partially explain.

I have recently written about the dawning of my interest in early music, dating it in 1987 when I “found” the Hilliard Ensemble, Josquin, Byrd and others on the radio – click here or below:

The Day That Early Music Found Me, 31 October 1987

But actually I was brought up with some early Baroque madrigals ringing in my ears – a reel-to-reel recording, made by my father, from the radio, of Monteverdi’s Madrigals of Love and War.

The extraordinary BBC genome Project allows me to find the concert in question so easily it is almost embarrassingly easy – it was broadcast on 4 June 1974 at 21:50 – click here. I wouldn’t have heard the recording on that day – clearly, but dad probably played it to me pretty soon afterwards and I remember listening to it a lot that summer. The concert had originally taken place in October 1973 – a few weeks after I started secondary school.

But I digress…

…except to say that I had never heard any Madrigals of Love and War live and was keen to hear some – hence my particular desire to book this concert.

Thursday evening is not (and in those days certainly was not) Janie’s favourite night to go to a concert. Nor is Monteverdi one of her favourites.

This concert conformed Janie’s view that Monteverdi is not really for her. All too noisy and the male singing is a bit shouty, she claims. I sort-of know what she means, without agreeing with the conclusion.

Janie did enjoy some of the instrumental music, though…

…here is a vid of some other folk playing the opening number we heard that evening – Falconieri’s lovely Ciaconna in G major:

…and Janie did enjoy seeing some of her favourite early music folk, such as Reiko Ichise on the viola da gamba and Janie’s pal, William Carter, on the theorbo.

Here is a vid with a good extract of John Elliot Gardiner and his Monteverdi mob being (in Janie’s terms) noisy and shouty:

…and here is a vid of the Academy of Ancient Music rehearsing L’Orfeo…

…and here is a YouTube in a rock video stylee of the soprano, Anna Prohaska, singing some Monteverdi on her own album…

…don’t ask me to explain the imagery in the above vid – I couldn’t even begin.

Ensemble La Fenice, A Pilgrimage To Santiago, St John’s Smith Square, 21 May 2007

Wow, we loved this concert.

The last of our visits to the Lufthansa Festival of Baroque Music that year, this one really inspired us.  It comprises religious baroque music from the places people would visit on a pilgrimage to Santiago de Compostella.

The lovely Arianna Savall sang and played the renaissance harp.  She is the daughter of Jordi Savall and Montserrat Figueras.

So insired by this concert were we, that we made our own “pilgrimage to Santiago” the following spring, after visiting nephew Paul in Barcelona – click here for our pictures of Santiago.

Disappointing though, was the fact that we were unable to buy a recording of the music we heard.  All that was available for purchase on the night was mum and dad’s “Homenatge Al Misteri D’Elx – La Vespra” – interesting music but not the beautiful stuff we heard that night.

Surprised and delighted was I, therefore, to discover just now, while researching this blog piece, Ensemble La Fenice/Arianna Savall released a recording of the very stuff we heard that night, a mere four years after our concert.  I immediately purchased and downloaded the album and am listening to it as I write.  It really is lovely music.

Ensemble La Fenice