Customer Reviews

Giovanni Battista Sammartini: Sacred Cantatas

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Giovanni Battista Sammartini (c.1700-1775) gets all of three lines in the Oxford Dictionary of Music, and one of those lines acclaims him as... the teacher of Gluck! He was that, as well as one of Mozart's acknowledged musical models. He was also a remarkably progressive composer, writing symphonies in the 1730s and 1740s, when Haydn was a teenager, that often sound like full-blown classicism of three decades later. If any one composer could be seen as the 'link' between the baroque and the classical styles, it would be Sammartini.

Conductor and musicologist Daniele Ferrari, another Milanese, seems to be devoting his career to reestablishing Sammartini's reputation. This recording of two sacred cantatas should certainly help do the trick. The singing is very fine, with contralto Sonia Prina and soprano Silvia Mapelli tossing off their historical embellishments with fiery passion. The structure of the two cantatas is quite simple: an ouverture, then a succession of rectitavos preparing the mood for the arias of each soloist in turn, and concluded with a vigorous terzetto chorus. Simplification was Sammartini's mode of seeking an affective personal contact with his audience, and one could say that his willingness to stir the audience in their seats was perhaps a first step toward classicism and concert halls. But Sammartini's simplification is never musically simple-minded. Rather, it comes across as supple melodicism.

These two cantatas, especially Maria Addolorata, are somber, at times doleful, music, with a powerful religious intensity of feeling. They were both performed first in the church of San Fedele in Milano in 1751. Ferrari has recorded at least two other CDs - on Naxos, with its bargain prices - of Sammartini's sacred cantatas. Each of those CDs also includes a symphony from his later period.

I wasn't 'taken' with the orchestral timbres of Ferrari's Capriccio Italiano Ensemble on first hearing. If my ears are correct, they are performing on modern instruments played as closely as possible to historically informed technique. Or possibly they are conservatory grads playing original instruments in a modern manner. Naxos doesn't provide the most lifelike audio, certainly not on a par with Glossa for instance. However, listening again, on my best sound system, I've come to find the instrumental performance quite good enough to support the excellent singing. There are a few other recordings of Sammartini, by more stylistically mature instrumental groups including Ensemble 415, but they are costly. If you find yourself developing a taste for Sammartini, those CDs will always be available.