Il Giardino Armonico Deux Music of The French Baroque [dvd Untouched]

For her first collaboration with the period ensemble Il Giardino Armonico, violinist Isabelle Faust performs the five Violin Concertos of Wolfgang Amadeus Mozart, along with three shorter concertante works. This is an extraordinary set, for the historically informed performances, the polished sound of the group, the almost palpable presence of the players, which Harmonia Mundi has captured with superior engineering, and for the unrepressed joy in the music. Faust is the center of attention, naturally, and her refined and expressive playing immediately pulls the listener in. These are far from the most demanding concertos in the repertoire, so Faust is less concerned with technical execution than with conveying the pure feeling of the music, which is delightfully buoyant and uplifting. Under the direction of Giovanni Antonini, the group provides warm and sparkling accompaniment that gives Faust all the support she needs, but there's no doubt that she sets the emotional tone for these exquisite recordings. Highly recommended, especially for devotees of Classical style at its finest.

The senses reign, and Reason now is dead (Petrarch). Giovanni Antonini, flautist and founder of the legendary Italian ensemble Il Giardino Armonico, enjoys musical voyages, the discursiveness of music. He begins with an anonymous 16th century pavane, La Morte della Ragione (The Death of Reason), which he believes refers to In Praise of Folly, in which its author Erasmus distinguishes between two forms of madness: a sweet illusion of the spirit, and a negative form, one that the vengeful Furies conjure up from hell…

Multi award-winning period performance ensemble Il Giardino Armonico, led by the charismatic and inspiring Giovanni Antonini, make their first appearance on the newly invigorated l'oiseau lyre label with a wonderful new recording of Handel's 12 concerti grossi op. 6 to mark the composer's anniversary year (2009). Handel's concerti grossi, op. 6 are one of the pillars of baroque orchestral music. Il Giardino Armonico takes a characteristically dramatic and instinctively Italian view of the music (Handel did after all hone his compositional skills in Italy before settling in England). The group hopes to reclaim Handel for Italy by exploring some of the unique qualities that their native temperament can bring to the music.

Mezzo Cecilia Bartoli could easily rest on her laurels as one of today's most charismatic, characterful singers for her lively portrayals of Mozart and Rossini heroines. But it's been particularly exciting to observe her growth as an artist in exploring the exuberant world of baroque opera, with its range of pyrotechnic demands–both vocal and emotional. Bartoli's show-stopping virtuosity in a Vivaldi aria from her Live in Italy recital gave a tantalizing sample of her finesse in that style. For The Vivaldi Album, Bartoli conducted extensive research into the composer's manuscripts.

Though he called them concertos, Vivaldi’s RV87-108 are basically chamber pieces, comprising obbligato parts for between three to six instruments (mostly winds) plus basso continuo. Of the 22 such concertos attributed to Vivaldi, three are now considered spurious: the remaining 19 have been collected onto CD by a new Italian period-instrument group, Il Giardino Armonico. The vigour, the zest of these performances is infectious. Il Giardino Armonico marry sharp ensembles to breezy tempos and at times a markedly exuberant sense of dynamics. Some may find the results abrasive, but I enjoyed the extra frisson of drama the group extracts from the music.

A beautiful scenic film by Olivier Simonnet. Filmed in high-definition widescreen. Cecilia Bartoli sings virtuoso arias from her Sacrificium album, on location in and around the spectacular baroque palace of Caserta in Southern Italy, just outside of Naples. This unique film shows Cecilia Bartoli in full costume singing a selection of showpiece arias written for the castrato stars of the Neapolitan school. Ravishing locations including the Court Theatre, the stunning Vestibule and the Palace Gardens. Arias include Handel's "Ombra mai fu" and Broschi's "Son qual nave"–previously only available in the deluxe version of the album.

"The age of the castratos was one of the most dazzling and remarkable in European music history. Seldom has there ever been such a complete fusion of sensuousness and splendor, form and content, poetry and music, and, above all, such a perfection of vocal virtuosity, as was achieved in the glory days of the Baroque era. The legendary art of the castratos continues to exert its fascination even today, and despite the great human sacrifice it exacted, a new assessment of this extraordinary period is surely justified." - Cecilia Bartoli Cecilia Bartoli uncovers the extraordinary and cruel world of the `Castrati' and sings the glorious music they inspired. The all-new album consists almost entirely of world-premiere recordings of some of the most virtuosic music ever written for the human voice.

The German soprano Anna Prohaska joins Alpha Classics for several recording projects. Her first recital brings together two superb African queens – Dido and Cleopatra – and follows them all over Europe during the first century of opera, from the 1640s to 1740. A firework display of arias, virtuosic and tragic by turns, written by the leading personalities of Baroque music (Cavalli, Handel, Purcell, Hasse) and composers still awaiting rediscovery suchas Sartorio, Graupner and the Venetian Castrovillari./quote]

Giovanni Antonini and his ensemble Il Giardino Armonico celebrate the composer who made them famous: Antonio Vivaldi. Their recordings of The Four Seasons and Cecilia Bartoli's famous first Vivaldi recital left an indelible mark on the discography of the Red-haired Priest! Their musical fireworks display continues with a programme of concertos that is bound to provoke strong reactions, since it is the result of a meeting with a musician who is equally adept at shifting boundaries, the violinist Patricia Kopatchinskaja. Together they have devised a programme entitled WHAT'S NEXT VIVALDI?, which interweaves ultra-virtuosic concertos by Vivaldi (Il Grosso Mogul RV 208, La Tempesta di Mare (for violin!) RV 253, and RV 157, 191, 550 among others) with, between each concerto, short pieces written by much more recent composers, Luca Francesconi, Simone Movio, Giacinto Scelsi, Aureliano Cattaneo and Giovanni Sollima, and mostly commissioned by Patricia Kopatchinskaja especially for this programme.