Arianna

Queen Christina of Sweden was a lavish patron of music in her own kingdom - initially she mainly extended her patronage to French musicians but from 1652 it was largely Italian musicians whom she brought to her court in Stockholm. Having secretly converted to Catholicism, Christina abdicated in June of 1654 and almost immediately left Sweden - most of her valuable library had been smuggled out earlier - and made her way to Rome, her journey there seeming at times to be effectively a series of triumphal processions; there’s a fine account of all these events in Veronica Buckley’s Christina. Once established in Rome - where her arrival was greeted by special musical performances in the Palazzo Barberini, the Palazzo Pamphili and elsewhere - she soon became one of the city’s most active patrons of literature and music.

Instead of focusing on a single work or repertory, Jordi Savall, together with his wife Montserrat Figueras and their children Arianna and Ferran Savall, here offers what he terms "a highly personal selection of the music that has moved us by its tenderness and beauty, as well as its ability to promote dialogue and harmony." Thus we have melodies and mostly improvisatory instrumental pieces from a variety of traditions, opening with an absolutely delectable love song by the thirteenth century Galician-Portuguese troubador Martin Codax, and proceeding through music from Afghanistan, Morocco, Sephardic Judaism, France, Mexico, and the inspiration of the various Savalls themselves, among various other sources.

The brothers Marcello, Alessandro and the more famous Benedetto, were born into an illustrious patrician family in Venice in 1684 and 1686 respectively. The eldest, with his eclectic talent, proved to be attracted to both the arts and the sciences from an early age; the youngest, better known as the “prince of sacred music”, was about to study the violin very young. According to legend, still children, Alessandro mocked him for his lack of talent in front of the princess of Brunswick, which made him swear to devote himself to musical studies in a zealous manner.

Hirundo Maris is Latin for “sea swallow” and, like that bird’s flight, harpist Arianna Savall’s quintet – part early music ensemble, part folk group – drifts on musical currents between Norway and Catalonia, and adds its own songs, created on the wing. Savall and co-leader Petter Udland Johansen have shaped a band with a bright, glistening timbral blend, capped by Arianna’s ice-clear voice, well-equipped to address songs of the north and the south.

There’s no way around it. Arianna Savall sounds exactly like a young Emma Kirkby, and if you like that straight-toned, sharply focused soprano quality, with just the bare hint of a vibrato at the very ends of phrases, then you’ll find Savall very satisfying and you’ll easily appreciate her superb interpretations of these rarely heard vocal works from 17th-century Italy. She begins with a magnificent cantata by Marco Marazzoli that sets the tone for the whole program–a “moral canzona” that focuses on the “literary theme of the rose”–and her vocal prowess is evident in her ability to lend enough dramatic force to the work to keep us interested for its entire 13 minutes. She lends a particularly warm and ingratiating quality to the beautifully wrought final minutes of the same composer’s “moral cantata” O mortal, whose text refers to the fate of the Biblical Samson, and repeatedly urges, “Do you desire even greater glories? Then learn how to conquer yourself.”