Monteverdi René Jacobs

First seen at La Monnaie in Brussels on 13 May 1998, this production of Monteverdi’s L’Orfeo seen through the eyes of Trisha Brown and René Jacobs has become an operatic classic in a few short years. This is doubtless because it offers a total symbiosis of music, text and movement – described by the critic of the Daily Telegraph of London as being ‘as close to the perfect dance opera as I have ever seen’. Or to quote Gilles Macassar in Télérama: ‘In the pit and onstage, the Brussels production has only one watchword: mobility, nimbleness, dexterity. The singers run, fly, whirl like dancers defying gravity. From the flies down to the footlights, the whole theatre is under a fantastic spell.’ For Christophe Vetter, on ConcertoNet: ‘This Orfeo can be seen again and again with immense pleasure. . . . René Jacobs’s conducting continues to arouse admiration for its precision, its stylistic rigour, its inexhaustible inventiveness and its feeling for the contrasts so vital to this repertoire.’

The Italian opera of the 17th century is a part of music history which is still hardly explored. Of course, Claudio Monteverdi's operas are regularly performed and recorded, and some of the stage works by his pupil Francesco Cavalli, the main composer of operas in Venice after Monteverdi's death has been given attention to, but many other works written in Italy in the 17th century are still to be rediscovered. One of the composers of that time whose works are hardly explored is Pietro Antonio Cesti. From the tracklist one may conclude that he was a prolific composer of operas. René Jacobs has been an avid advocate of Cesti's oeuvre, and in 1982 he made a recording of L'Orontea, arias from which he also performed at the concert in 1980 recorded and only recently released by ORF. He also gave performances of L'Argia, but so far that hasn't been recorded on disc.

René Jacobs began his career as a countertenor and quickly earned the reputation as one of the finest of his time. But he gradually turned to conducting and since the turn of the new century has rarely sung in concert. As a countertenor Jacobs championed a string of forgotten Baroque composers on his recordings: Antonio Cesti, Sigismondo d'India, Luca Marenzio, Pierre Guédron, Michel Lambert, and others.

Founded by René Jacobs in 1977 for a series of recordings with harmoniamundi France, Concerto Vocale soon built up a reputation on theEuropean musical scene as a major force in the rediscovery of therepertoire of Baroque chamber music for voices. Alongside René Jacobs,the ensemble secured the services of musicians of the front rank, amongthem William Christie, Sigiswald and Wieland Kuijken, Konrad Junghänel,and Jaap Ter Linden.

This luxurious set containing 39 CDs, 3 DVDs, 1 CD-Rom and four detailed booklets will tell you the full story of Baroque opera in Italy, France, England, and Germany. No fewer than 17 complete operas (including two on DVD) and two supplementary CDs (the dawn of opera, Overtures for the Hamburg Opera) provide the most comprehensive overview of the genre ever attempted! The finest performers are assembled here under the direction of René Jacobs and William Christie to offer you 47 hours of music. An opportunity to discover or to hear again the masterpieces of Baroque opera, some of which have been unavailable on CD for many years.

Monteverdi - Madrigali Guerrieri Ed Amorosi - Concerto Vocale, René Jacobs (2002) {2CD Set Harmonia Mundi HMC 901736.37}
EAC rip (secure mode) | FLAC (tracks)+CUE+LOG -> 701 Mb | MP3 @320 -> 369 Mb
Full Artwork @ 300 dpi (jpg) -> 87 Mb | 5% repair rar
© 2001 Harmonia Mundi | HMC 901736.37
Classical / Baroque / Vocal Music

Monteverdi was seventy-one when he published his Eighth Book of madrigals. This collection, a monumental work of remarkable beauty, is a synthesis of all Monteverdi's experience in the realm of secular music. It is the culmination of a genre, the Italian madrigal, which here achieves a rare state of perfection. INDISPENSABLE!

SEON (Studio Erichson) is a period music label by the legendary producer Wolf Erichson. Erichson founded the label in 1969 as one of the first labels dedicated only to authentic music. The recordings were made with the best available recording techniques of the time and still deliver a high quality product in line with today's standards. This special boxset offers all SEON CD reissues from the late 90s on 85 CDs in a limited edition boxset.

The recordings are typical DHM with superb clarity and dynamic range. The mastering to digital is excellent, and the booklet accompanying the series, while brief, is informative. The only unifying these here is baroque Italian composers, but it's extremely easy to fill a collection ten times this size with material from that category. What we end up with in these ten discs is a lovely mix of known and unknown, each pleasant to listen to and discover, and there's no listener fatigue at all working through these discs.