I Gemelli Monteverdi.

Monteverdi’s L’Orfeo - premiered in 1607 at the Ducal Palace in Mantua - is a unique masterpiece in its way of thinking and representing music that never ceases to inspire the greatest.Emiliano Gonzalez Toro, at the heart of his ensemble I Gemelli, signs his third recording for naïve with this luxuriant reading refocused around the voice, which exalts both the aesthetics inherited from the Renaissance and the modernity of a virtuoso score.This production, hailed on the stages of Paris and Toulouse at the end of 2019, has the singularity of being conducted ‘by the voice’ by the tenor, who plays the title role while directing singers and instrumentalists. Emiliano Gonzalez Toro displays his care - not only for himself but also for the ten soloists who surround him - with richly ornamented vocal lines that contrast in their dynamics and climates, always keeping the narration and interventions of the characters in tension.

Claudio Monteverdi's Il ritorno d'Ulisse in Patria is a love story pur sang. With this opera he narrates the long-awaited homecoming of Odysseus after his mythical travels in the aftermath of the Trojan War. After L’Orfeo - on the programme later this season - it was the second opera composed by the Italian master. Performing this masterpiece is I Gemelli, a young French ensemble founded by Chilean-Swiss tenor Emiliano Gonzalez Toro. The ensemble consists of a splendid cast including Fleur Barron, Emöke Barath and Zachary Wilder. Together, they will transform this tale of the union between Odysseus and his beloved Penelope into a breathtaking evening.

Claudio Monteverdi's Il ritorno d'Ulisse in Patria is a love story pur sang. With this opera he narrates the long-awaited homecoming of Odysseus after his mythical travels in the aftermath of the Trojan War. After L’Orfeo - on the programme later this season - it was the second opera composed by the Italian master. Performing this masterpiece is I Gemelli, a young French ensemble founded by Chilean-Swiss tenor Emiliano Gonzalez Toro. The ensemble consists of a splendid cast including Fleur Barron, Emöke Barath and Zachary Wilder. Together, they will transform this tale of the union between Odysseus and his beloved Penelope into a breathtaking evening.

The giant against whom all Italian composers were measured throughout the seventeenth century was Monteverdi, the absolute monarch of vocal music and, if not inventor, at least the genial promoter of new forms. Emiliano Gonzalez Toro, Zachary WIlder and I Gemelli have chosen to focus on the reflections of this tutelary figure, evoking the master rather than the citer.

Fondé en 2018 par le chanteur Emiliano Gonzalez Toro, spécialiste de musique baroque et en particulier de Monteverdi, l’ensemble I Gemelli s’est donné pour vocation de défendre les grandes œuvres du « Seicento » italien (XVIIe siècle pour les Français), n’hésitant pas à révéler de nombreuses partitions encore inédites attendant, dans la profondeur des bibliothèques, les musiciens qui les feront revivre.

Emiliano Gonzalez Toro, né en 1976 à Genève, est un chanteur d'opéra suisse d'origine chilienne de tessiture ténor, spécialisé dans la musique baroque.Il dirige avec Mathilde Étienne la formation musicale qu'ils ont fondée, I Gemelli, et travaille de manière approfondie l'art lyrique du Seicento italien (xviie siècle) autour des œuvres de Monteverdi, et des compositeurs de cette époque.