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Monteverdi: Heaven and Earth
The King’s Consort, Robert King
The star item in the opera selections is the aria 'Possente spirto'...[Charles Daniels] is vocally clear and magically acrobatic in the melodic cascades...Connolly's rendering of Poppea's farewell...
Monteverdi: Heaven and Earth
The King’s Consort, Robert King
Purchase product
The star item in the opera selections is the aria 'Possente spirto'...[Charles Daniels] is vocally clear and magically acrobatic in the melodic cascades...Connolly's rendering of Poppea's farewell...
About
Fourth release on the new VIVAT label features an outstanding collection of vocal music by Claudio Monteverdi.
14 glorious tracks present an exquisitely varied programme on the theme of love in all its conflicting emotions, its joys and sweet pains affecting gods and mere mortals.
All-star cast including Carolyn Sampson, Sarah Connolly, Rebecca Outram, Charles Daniels and James Gilchrist joined by The King’s Consort’s highly colourful instrumental ensemble.
Includes the melancholy ‘Lamento della Ninfa’, the virtuoso ‘Zefiro torna’, exquisite love duets, Orfeo’s famous ‘Possente spirto’, a plangent lament from ‘Poppea’, and Monteverdi’s extraordinary ‘Hor che il ciel’.
Recorded in the unsurpassed acoustic of St Jude-on-the-Hill, London.
48 page booklet with authoritative liner note by renowned Monteverdi scholar Prof. John Whenham, plus full texts and translations.
Contents and tracklist
- Carolyn Sampson (soprano)
- King's Consort
- Recorded: 18 January and 7-10 February 2002
- Recording Venue: St. Jude's Church, London NW11, United Kingdom
- Charles Daniels (tenor), James Gilchrist (tenor)
- King's Consort
- Recorded: 18 January and 7-10 February 2002
- Recording Venue: St. Jude's Church, London NW11, United Kingdom
- Carolyn Sampson (soprano), Rebecca Outram (soprano)
- King's Consort
- Recorded: 18 January and 7-10 February 2002
- Recording Venue: St. Jude's Church, London NW11, United Kingdom
- Sarah Connolly (mezzo-soprano)
- King's Consort
- Recorded: 18 January and 7-10 February 2002
- Recording Venue: St. Jude's Church, London NW11, United Kingdom
- Carolyn Sampson (soprano), Diana Moore (mezzo-soprano), Charles Daniels (tenor), John Bowen (tenor), Michael George (bass)
- King's Consort
- Recorded: 18 January and 7-10 February 2002
- Recording Venue: St. Jude's Church, London NW11, United Kingdom
- Charles Daniels (tenor), James Gilchrist (tenor)
- Recorded: 18 January and 7-10 February 2002
- Recording Venue: St. Jude's Church, London NW11, United Kingdom
- King's Consort
- Recorded: 18 January and 7-10 February 2002
- Recording Venue: St. Jude's Church, London NW11, United Kingdom
- Charles Daniels (tenor)
- Recorded: 18 January and 7-10 February 2002
- Recording Venue: St. Jude's Church, London NW11, United Kingdom
- Carolyn Sampson (soprano), Rebecca Outram (soprano)
- King's Consort
- Recorded: 18 January and 7-10 February 2002
- Recording Venue: St. Jude's Church, London NW11, United Kingdom
- Carolyn Sampson (soprano)
- King's Consort
- Recorded: 18 January and 7-10 February 2002
- Recording Venue: St. Jude's Church, London NW11, United Kingdom
- King's Consort
- Recorded: 18 January and 7-10 February 2002
- Recording Venue: St. Jude's Church, London NW11, United Kingdom
Awards and reviews
October 2013
The star item in the opera selections is the aria 'Possente spirto'...[Charles Daniels] is vocally clear and magically acrobatic in the melodic cascades...Connolly's rendering of Poppea's farewell to Rome ('A Dio, Roma') is a revelation, powerful and moving...[the recordings'] consistent musicality provides an impressive introduction to Monteverdi's art.
Awards Issue 2013
Given the impressive cast involved, this anthology is in a sense self-recommending...This mix of opera and madrigal is a deft piece of programming, arguably worth the price of admission.
Recorded in 2002, but previously unreleased, this is a “greatest hits”, and none the worse for that...some of the choicest numbers from the last four books of madrigals, each work a distilled music drama.
