Music for a While: Improvisations on Purcell (Standard Edition)
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Label: Erato
Cat No: 2564633750
Format: CD
Number of Discs: 1
Genre: Vocal/Choral
Release Date: 3rd March 2014
Contents
Works
HallelujahA Prince of glorious race, from Who can from joy refrain?
An Evening Hymn, Z193 'Now that the sun hath veiled his light'
Come ye Sons of Art, Z323
Man that is born of a woman, Z27
Music for a while, Z583
Ode for St Cecilia's Day
The Fairy Queen, Z629
Artists
Philippe Jaroussky (countertenor)Raquel Andueza (soprano)
Vincenzo Capezzuto (alto)
Dominique Visse (countertenor)
Gianluigi Trovesi (clarinet)
Wolfgang Muthspiel (guitar)
L’Arpeggiata
Conductor
Christina PluharWorks
HallelujahA Prince of glorious race, from Who can from joy refrain?
An Evening Hymn, Z193 'Now that the sun hath veiled his light'
Come ye Sons of Art, Z323
Man that is born of a woman, Z27
Music for a while, Z583
Ode for St Cecilia's Day
The Fairy Queen, Z629
Artists
Philippe Jaroussky (countertenor)Raquel Andueza (soprano)
Vincenzo Capezzuto (alto)
Dominique Visse (countertenor)
Gianluigi Trovesi (clarinet)
Wolfgang Muthspiel (guitar)
L’Arpeggiata
Conductor
Christina PluharAbout
After the intoxicating heat of Mediterraneo, released in 2013, Christina Pluhar and her ensemble L’Arpeggiata – again in the company of countertenor Philippe Jaroussky, soprano Raquel Andueza and alto singer Vincenzo Capezzuto – now head to the cooler climes of England with 'Music for a while', an album based on the haunting, graceful and sometimes deeply moving music of Henry Purcell.
Often considered England’s greatest composer, Purcell (1659-1695) represents an especially good match for the aesthetic of L’Arpeggiata: he made frequent use of the ground bass, a repeated (ostinato) figure in the lower line – the most famous instance of this occurs in Dido’s lament ‘When I am laid in earth’, the closing number from his opera Dido and Aeneas. The ground bass provides an ideal foundation for the brilliant, sometimes jazz-like improvisation that is the stock-in-trade of the L’Arpeggiata, here comprising singers, (plucked) strings, wind instruments, keyboard and percussion.
As the New York Times has written: “Just as the composers and ensembles that ply the indie path in new music combine structures and language from contemporary classical styles with gestures and timbres from pop and world music, L’Arpeggiata has lately been hopping through cultures and across centuries. The group uses modern pop vocal inflections and improvisational techniques from jazz in its performances of antique pieces ... Its audacious hybrids are driven principally by a fascination with reviving the Baroque art of ornamental extemporization and a curiosity about how contemporary improvisatory styles might be enlisted in that quest.”
The contemporary element in 'Music for a while' (named after a song written for John Dryden’s play Oedipus) is exemplified by the contribution, on acoustic and electric guitar, of Austrian jazz-player Wolfgang Muthspiel, while the Baroque tradition is embodied in the celebrated French countertenor Dominique Visse, a singer who set an example for Philippe Jaroussky. Visse was a student of the pioneering British countertenor Alfred Deller (1912-1979), closely associated with the music of Purcell and the revival of interest in Baroque music.
Track listing:
1. ‘Twas within a furlong
2. Music for a while
3. Strike the viol
4. An Evening Hymn upon a Ground
5. In vain the am’rous flute
6. A Prince of glorious race descended
7. Oh solitude, my sweetest choice
8. When I am laid in earth (Dido’s Lament)
9. Wondrous machine
10. Here the deities approve
11. Ah ! Belinda
12. Hark ! how the songsters of the grove
13. One charming night
14. Man is for woman made
15. O let me weep (The Plaint)
16. Curtain Tune on a Ground
17. Halleluja (Leonard Cohen) – Bonus Track
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