Home » Events » Jessica Gould and Ensemble L’Aura Soave: I Diletti di Mazzarino / At the Pleasure of Mazari

Jessica Gould and Ensemble L’Aura Soave: I Diletti di Mazzarino / At the Pleasure of Mazari

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Date/Time
Date(s) - 06/04/2018
5:00 PM - 6:30 PM

Location
Sant'Agnese in Agone

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Ensemble L’Aura Soave

  • Amie Weiss – violin
  • Dario Palmisano – violin
  • Diego Cantalupi – theorbo
  • Davide Pozzi – harpsichord

Italian: Nato nel Regno di Napoli e cresciuto nella Roma Pontificia della Controriforma, il Cardinale Giulio Raimondo Mazzarino si trasferì a Parigi dove, nominato Ministro Plenipotenziario di Francia, diventò il più potente consigliere del Re Sole. La dedizione agli splendori dell’arte fu una caratteristica costante del suo operato e la musica da lui commissionata a compositori legati alla corte medicea – quali Luigi Rossi, Giacomo Carissimi, Virgilio Mazzocchi e Francesco Cavalli – condizionò la coeva musica francese con temi ispirati alla mitologia classica e ai raffinati valori umanistici, dai toni proteiformi che spaziano dall’impeto guerriero ad un’elegiaca pacatezza.

Il concerto celebra l’uscita del CD “I Diletti di Mazzarino” e offrirà l’occasione di scoprire composizioni musicali, in parte inedite, conservate alla Bibliothèque Nationale de Paris.

English: A Cardinal who never took holy orders, Mazarin, né Giulio Raimondo Mazzarino, was born near Naples, grew up in Rome, and became Chief Minister of France. The most powerful advisor to Louis XIV was more fascinated by art than theology, importing innumerable Italian compositions and a fair number of Italian composers in service of the French state. His dedication to artistic splendor was a hallmark of his tenure and a gift to subsequent generations.

Native sons whom he championed include Luigi Rossi, Virgilio Mazzocchi, Francesco Cavalli and Giacomo Carissimi, and their work came to transform the music of France. Arias, cantatas, and operas by these Italian composers and more can be found to this day at the Bibliothèque Nationale de Paris, where many treasures of Mazarin’s collection still await a performance in our own time.

This CD release concert celebrates the new recording of At the Pleasure of Mazarin on the MV Cremona label.

I’ve never heard this specific piece sung before by anyone, probably because so few can, but in my experience with something like this, a singer either executes this kind of passagework with consummate ease or undermines the whole thing with even the slightest hint of technical struggle. Gould is master of it.

The apocalyptic dramatic expression she and her colleagues brought to the performance was as shocking and delightful as the precision and command of possibly the most demanding melismas I have ever heard in a baroque vocal work ever. Kudos to the superb basso continuo team Cantalupi and Pozzi for opening up the very gates of hell itself with a muscular earthquake of an introduction on instruments that are often (mis)perceived as precious and delicate.

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