Vicente Rafael

Founded in Valencia, Spain in 1973 - Disbanded in 1978. -Tarantula was one of the many prog bands that emerged in the second half of the Seventies, speerheaded by known Spanish formations like Triana, Blogue and Granada. They started as a quintet, led by keyboard player Vicente Guillot. -The melodic, very pleasant sound on their eponymous debut album from 1976 is not like the flamenco inspired groups as Triana, Cai or Mezquita but more close to the Seventies Italian Symphonic Prog (dramatic vocals by Rafael Cabrera evoking Banco and Le Orme along the lush vintage keyboards with wonderful drops of the unsurpassed Mellotron) and German symphonic prog like Jane and Ramses (harder-edged guitar and powerful organ runs).

Monteverdi is a seductive enough composer as to meet and play his music with no other intention than to enjoy it, taking from here and there some of his most attractive works and giving them life. Monteverdi Sessions is the sonorous testimony of two days in which Musica Ficta and the Ensemble Fontegara met with the simple and plain intention of tasting the music of the Cremona genius, squeezing everything that we could get out of it. Both Musica Ficta and Ensemble Fontegara were founded by Raul Mallavibarrena with the intention of exploring early music. Currently, Musica Ficta is Eva Juarez, Marta Infante, Alicia Berri, Miguel Bernal, Luis Vicente and Raul Mallavibarrena, and Ensemble Fontegara consists of harpist Marie Nishiyama and guitarist Rafael Bonavita.