O Globo 5 de Agosto de 2015

Flor De Loto is a present Peruvian Progressive rock band, led by the flautist Johnny Perez. The outfit brillantly blends elements of Seventies Progressive rock with Andean music. This style might as well remind of Jethro Tull, if Ian Anderson's band ever felt like emigrating to South America! Flute and guitar riffs are omnipresent, which enhances the charm of this elegant and joyful music.

Unlike Rameau's other operatic output, 'Le Temple de la Gloire' has been incomprehensibly neglected on disc and on the stage until very recently. There have been a few recordings of the dances from the opera, arranged into suites, but this is the first recording of the complete work. The libretto by Voltaire involves mainly allegorical, symbolic and mythical characters, but its intention is serious – namely to demonstrate his philosophy advocating tolerance, freedom, the welfare and contentment of the people. Of course these are concepts which few of us would argue with today, but it was a different matter under the absolutism of the 18th century.

The successor to Music in Europe at the time of the Renaissance, this second volume in our History of Early Music is devoted to the music of the first part of the Baroque period in Italy, from the Florentine Camerata and the first operas to the heirs of Monteverdi; it was at that time that the freedom of structure characteristic of the beginning of the 17th century began to give way to the first traces of formalism. This period covers almost an entire century, beginning with the performances of La Pellegrina mounted in Florence in 1589 and ending with the final operas of Francesco Cavalli in the early 1670s. The sacred and the profane mingled and met during this period, which also saw the birth of accompanied monody, opera and oratorio, virtuoso performance and the sonata; it is precisely this same mix that we see in the Nativity by Caravaggio that appears on the cover of this set. The musical expression of this Baroque aesthetic is the subject of Jérome Lejeune’s accompanying dissertation.

THE FIRST OF THE TWELVE discs in this collection of Anna Moffo’s RCA recital recordings begins with a 1960 performance of the jewel song from Gounod’s Faust, and that selection, along with the others on this disc, sets out the singer’s basic assets and liabilities. It’s a fresh lyric sound - Moffo was twenty-eight that year - ven throughout the range, accurate in pitch and coloratura, with a good try at a trill.

THE FIRST OF THE TWELVE discs in this collection of Anna Moffo’s RCA recital recordings begins with a 1960 performance of the jewel song from Gounod’s Faust, and that selection, along with the others on this disc, sets out the singer’s basic assets and liabilities. It’s a fresh lyric sound—Moffo was twenty-eight that year—even throughout the range, accurate in pitch and coloratura, with a good try at a trill. She phrases with musicality but not much nuance or variety of color. These qualities serve her and the music well in the coloratura fireworks of the shadow song from Meyerbeer’s Dinorah; “Bel raggio,” from Rossini’s Semiramide; and the bell song from Delibes’s Lakmé, all of which she tosses off with ease. Micaela’s aria from Carmen, however, demands more emotional thrust, while her Mimì and Liù are bland and anonymous.

Like many of England's finest musicians, Andrew Lawrence-King began his career in choir school, serving as head chorister for the Cathedral and Parish Church of St. Peter Port, Guernsey. He took an organ scholarship to Cambridge University, where he read mathematics, but finished his studies in organ and voice at the London Early Music Centre. A party at a harpmaker's house gave the opportunity for Lawrence-King to own his first early harp, modeled after a Medieval Irish instrument.

Recent musicological research tends to suggest that the 'Markuspassion' is not the work of Reinhard Keiser, essentially for stylistic reasons. However, it has not yet proved possible to attribute it positively to any other contemporary composer, such as Nicolaus Bruhns, or to Gottfried Keiser, Reinhard’s father, and so its paternity is currently uncertain.

Symphony X is an American progressive/power metal band from New Jersey founded in 1994 by guitarist Michael Romeo. The band came into existence when guitarist and composer Michael Romeo recorded a demo tape entitled "The Dark Chapter" with the keyboardist, and future band mate, Michael Pinnella in early 1994. Romeo distributed the tape to various recording labels and, due to the tape's reception in Japan, he got himself a record deal in the Land of the rising Sun with the now defunct Zero Corporations Label. Musically Symphony X is similar to, although heavier than most other progressive metal bands to which they are commonly compared: Dream Theater, Fates Warning and Pain of Salvation. They play in a very syncopated, progressive fashion, also incorporating elements of symphonic metal into their sound…

Chantal Santon-Jeffery est maintenant bien connue des baroqueux. Elle mène une belle carrière aussi bien dans le baroque français qu’italien des XVIIe et XVIIIe siècles, participant notamment à la plupart des résurrections du Palazetto Bru Zane. Depuis quelques années, on la croise même dans l’opéra contemporain, Janacek ou Britten. Il faut dire que son soprano ample, son timbre brillant, la qualité de sa diction et son attention à la dramatisation des textes ont de quoi séduire, d’autant que la dame est aventureuse.