Roberta Invernizzi / Yetzabel Arias Fernández / Romina Basso / La Risonanza / Fabio Bonizzoni HANDEL Olinto pastore

The Accademia degli Arcadi - that thought-provoking and ideas-creating literary circle set up by a group of poets, composers, aristocrats and churchmen, which championed a return to classical (and pastoral) ideals and one of whose keenest members was the Marquis Francesco Maria Ruspoli, Handel’s patron in Rome - forms the aesthetic background for this sixth and penultimate release in the series of Italian cantatas by the Saxon composer which Fabio Bonizzoni and La Risonanza are making for Glossa. In an engrossing essay written by Carlo Vitali (which additionally benefits from the counsels of Michael Talbot), the listener/reader is introduced to the social and political references contained within the pastoral texts of Olinto, pastore arcade, Duello amoroso and Alpestre monte, the three Handel cantatas which make up this CD. For this disc Bonizzoni turns again to three of his regular singers (the sopranos Roberta Invernizzi and Yetzabel Arias Fernández and the mezzo soprano Romina Basso) as well as counting upon the services of his exceptional first violinist, the young Swiss Leila Schayegh, an up-and-coming player whose talent is beginning to be an open secret... The spring of 2010 is anticipated as seeing the conclusion of this Handel collection, the grand finale being that marvellous cantata Apollo e Dafne. (GLOSSA)

Roberta Invernizzi / Yetzabel Arias Fernández / Romina Basso / La Risonanza / Fabio Bonizzoni HANDEL Clori, Tirsi e Fileno

In May 1707 George Frideric Handel entered into the service of the Marquis Francesco Maria Ruspoli, and under his protection, embarked upon a tremendous career. As well as making a name for himself as a spectacular virtuoso on the harpsichord and organ, through his plentiful concerts in the Roman academies, Handel lost no time in also becoming a highly sought-after composer through his felicitous and apparently inexhaustible inspiration. In addition to a significant number of cantatas for solo voice and basso continuo, Handel also involved himself in composing cantatas for larger numbers of voices, combining these with a large supporting orchestral group.

The score of Clori, Tirsi e Fileno is certainly a complex one, as much for its dramatic plotline as for its individually-chosen musical options: the result is a genuine opera in miniature, equipped with real refinement and lightness. Consequently, Clori, Tirsi e Fileno turns - even more so than with other Italian cantata works by the caro Sassone - into an authentic laboratory in which Handel experiments with the most diverse musical and dramatic forms, obtaining by this method a capacity to elaborate that special language which was to locate it firmly within the glories of the theatre, from the past and the present. (GLOSSA)

Christiane Karg / Romina Basso / Il Complesso Barocco / Alan Curtis G.F. HANDEL Mitologia

One of the very last recordings of baroque-pioneer conductor Alan Curtis (1934-2015), a supreme Handelian conductor and scholar. Alan Curtis, described by the New York Times’ as “one of the great scholar-musicians of recent times”, conducts a brilliant cast including German soprano star Christiane Karg and the Italian mezzo soprano Romina Basso. Christiane Karg is one of those fascinating voices of our time. She is certainly one of today’s most interesting German singers with an international profile. Many of her recordings such as “Scene!”, “Heimliche Aufforderung” or “Portrait” (for Berlin Classics) have been internationally acclaimed and were big commecial successes. A selection of arias, duets and instrumental pieces from Handel masterworks such as Semele, Hercules, Partenope, a.o. With liner notes by the british Handel specialist Dr. David Vickers. Incl. a dedication by mystery writer Donna Leon, who was a close friend to Alan Curtis. (Presto Classical)

Romina Basso / Latinitas Nostra LAMENTO

Romina Basso's new album examines the 17th-century Italian lamento, a chamber cantata on an ostensibly tragic subject that is capable of embracing wider territory than a formal outpouring of grief. The prototype was Monteverdi's psychological work Lamento d'Arianna, drawn from a now lost opera of 1608. For his successors, however, the form had political potential. Carìssimi's Lamento in Morte di Maria Stuarda makes Counter-Reformation hagiography out of Mary, Queen of Scots, while Rossi's Lamento della Regina di Svezia mourns the death of Gustavus Adolphus of Sweden, killed in battle in 1632. The genre wasn't necessarily serious, either. Francesco Provenzale's Squarciato Appena Avea, for example, takes the Gustavus Adolphus story as point of departure for a scabrous study of his widow's sexuality. Among the greatest of all baroque interpreters, Basso is breathtakingly expressive and persuasive. The Greek period ensemble Latinitas Nostra is directed from the harpsichord by founder Markellos Chryssicos. Exceptional. (The Guardian.com)