Monteverdi il Combatimento Della Ninfa Harnoncourt

Anna Lucia Richter returns to PENTATONE after her acclaimed Schubert album Heimweh with Il delirio della passione; a recording full of Monteverdi treasures, from heart-wrenching opera scenes (Lamento d Arianna,Pur ti miro from Poppea and the Prologue of L'orfeo) and religious music (Confitebor) to bucolic songs (Si dolce è il tormento). Richter works together with Ensemble Claudiana and Luca Pianca, one of the most eminent Monteverdi interpreters of our age. They offer a fresh perspective on Monteverdi's music by penetrating deeply into the original sources.

Anna Prohaska’s recital takes us into the moss-carpeted dreamworlds of Ariosto, Ovid, Shakespeare and Tasso. The theme is transformation, by love or magic or a combination of the two. Arcangelo’s instrumental playing is reliably interesting, sometimes too interesting (Jonathan Cohen is not a ‘less is more’ director). But the most effective enchantment occurs when Prohaska stops trying to fit her dryish, coolish voice into a Patricia Petitbon-shaped presentation box.

Anna Lucia Richter returns to PENTATONE after her acclaimed Schubert album Heimweh with Il delirio della passione; a recording full of Monteverdi treasures, from heart-wrenching opera scenes (Lamento d’Arianna, ‘Pur ti miro’ from Poppea and the Prologue of L’orfeo) and religious music (Confitebor) to bucolic songs (Si dolce è il tormento). Richter works together with Ensemble Claudiana and Luca Pianca, one of the most eminent Monteverdi interpreters of our age.

This innovative program pairing the seemingly antithetical compositions of Claudio Monteverdi and Astor Piazzolla was first featured at the Ambronay Festival in 2009 and was greeted with nearly universal acclaim. The brainchild of Argentine conductor Leonardo Garcia Alarcon and his ensemble Cappella Mediterranea, this unusual collection highlights the surprising connections and musical synergies present in works that are separated by centuries of time and thousands of miles. Under the baton of Alarcon, the madrigal and the tango are revealed as be musical sisters, both conjuring up powerful emotions - from nostalgia to sorrow to ecstasy - and rich in improvisational freedom.

This innovative program pairing the seemingly antithetical compositions of Claudio Monteverdi and Astor Piazzolla was first featured at the Ambronay Festival in 2009 and was greeted with nearly universal acclaim. The brainchild of Argentine conductor Leonardo Garcia Alarcon and his ensemble Cappella Mediterranea, this unusual collection highlights the surprising connections and musical synergies present in works that are separated by centuries of time and thousands of miles.