Leonardo Leo

Neapolitan music of the 18th century, so important in the formation of the musical lingua franca of the Classical period, is a massively neglected area wherein lie many riches. Despite his greater interest in opera, Leo was maestro di cappella at the Naples royal chapel and composed a good deal of church music, especially towards the end of his life (he died in 1744), in which sound counterpoint and the clarity of modern melodic developments are successfully combined. These are not sterile exercises in ‘old-style’ polyphony, but works of honest, thoroughly Italianate expression.

Simply put, if you enjoy 18th-century violin music, you'll find an hour of pure pleasure listening to this expertly played program of unusual, rarely heard concertos by mostly lesser-known Neapolitan composers (Pergolesi excepted!). Elizabeth Wallfisch and her colleagues deliver performances that can only be described as ideal–sensibly paced, articulate, and to the point. They just play the music, albeit with sincere attention to its innate rhythmic energy and assertive melodic character. There's a stylistic similarity to these pieces, but the spotlight moves from the vocally-inspired solo lines of Pergolesi's Concerto in B-flat and the A major sonata to the rich-textured orchestral dialog of Leonardo Leo's D major concerto for four violins.

A leading composer at the time Italian Leonardo Leo (1694-1744) is now relatively unknown. In his extensive output mainly consisting of dozens of operas and sacred works his instrumental music has had a somewhat hidden existence. Although he was trained as a cellist himself his six concertos are the only solo pieces he wrote for the cello. Until 1700 writing solo for this accompaniment instrument par excellence had been unusual anyway.

WORLD PREMIERE in modern times of an unknown comic opera which was recently rediscovered along with other three other Leo operas at the Abbey of Montecassino. L Alidoro (Golden Wings) is a lost-and-found story which explores the themes of love and jealousy from different perspectives in particular age and social status interweaving comedy with more serious reflections. Director Arturo Cirillo explains how in this opera, nothing is happening except a subtle and gorgeous relational game among the seven protagonists.

Una sconosciuta opera di Leonardo Leo, importante maestro di una prima fase di scuola napoletana, impone nuovi stili e contenuti al genere della commedia per musica contribuendo a codificarne la forma poi perfezionata dagli autori del secondo Settecento.
Nel 1740 Leonardo Leo vive un anno di particolare intensità lavorativa: sei titoli teatrali tra rifacimenti e nuovi allestimenti tra cui L’Alidoro.
Frutto della collaborazione con il poeta napoletano Gennarantonio Federico, che predispone una commedia in cui i personaggi parlano lingue diverse (napoletano o toscano) a seconda della loro estrazione sociale e agiscono su differenti piani: uno comico e l’altro serio.

Greek mezzo-soprano, Mary-Ellen Nesi, who sings all five works, produces a stream of gloriously firm tone reminiscent of Bernada Fink, another superb mezzo on the scene these days. Her diction and moulding of phrases here is excellent. The two Leonardo Leo settings of the Salve Regina (in C Minor and F Major) which begin the disc are followed by a cello Concerto (also by Leonardo Leo) and a world premiere recording of an Alessandro Scarlatti setting of salve Regina (in C Minor) and then the two better known Pergolesi settings (in C and A Minor) conclude the disc. The cello soloist is lovely too and all works receive excellent support from Alan Curtis and Il Complesso Barocco.

Presented by the Festival della Valle d’Itria, this is the first modern-day staging of Leonardo Leo’s Neapolitan revision of Handel’s Rinaldo, a pastiche with a Mediterranean allure, which was composed in 1718 but considered lost until a few years ago. The story behind this rare opera is fascinating: the score of Handel’s masterpiece was brought illegally to Naples by the castrato singer Nicolò Grimaldi, who had performed Rinaldo in London. Once in Italy, the work was given a makeover by local composers, including Leo, who adapted it to the taste of the Neapolitan public, adding intermezzos and amusing characters.