Customer Reviews

Music of the Italian Renaissance

5 star:		(4)
4 star:		(1)
3 star:		(1)
2 star:		(0)
1 star:		(0)

 

 

Shirley Rumsey is such a gifted singer and musician. Each piece is so hauntingly beautiful. I find it amazing that someone with this much talent isn't better known. Oh well, if you are tired of the crap that is passing for music these days, just buy this cd and turn off the radio.

This is a beautiful album in all ways - lovely choice of repertoire, songs sung in believable period style with a clear strong voice, vibrant instrumentals. Usually when an artist both sings and plays, one of these elements is weaker. Not so here! If you like Renaissance music, get this - it's well worth its overly-modest price.

The main strength of this recording is the overall program. The selection of pieces, the order in which they are played, and the musical interpretation here make for a good recital. The interpretations I think are a little different than what is typical giving the listener a new perspective on some of these pieces. For example, one usually hears a Dalza Piva as a fairly driving dance piece; but on this recording the Piva is presented as a quietly sweet piece, and it works. Other than some unique, but tasteful interpretation, there is nothing especially outstanding about the performance here, good or bad. There are singers, such as Emma Kirkby, that have given early music vocal performances vastly superior to anything here; and there are lute players running around that can play Ms. Rumsey right into the ground. But this recording, taken as a whole, is enjoyable, bears up well to repeat listening, and is an excellent value.

I've listened to a lot of recordings of early Italian music, and this is among the best -- exquisitely played and sung. Rumsey has a gift for making this music both accessible and intimate, which is how it was intended. I can't believe the price is so low.

Here is a quite rare repertoire, 25 renaissance italian songs(among them few are pure music without words). Rumsey's voice deliberatly falls back off the tempo (only a bit), and with a drunken and dreaming tone. These make her voice very mesmerizing, and all the music is in an quite antique and classic mood. And she is so talented that she accompanys herself with a lute. This is a good listining experience indeed.

Ms. Rumsey is not a singer AND a musician. (Singers are musicians, thank you.) She is a musician of extreme talent and expertise in singing and playing multiple instruments. She really understands this genre and she is the number one musician who plays and sings frottole simultaneously. Ms Kirkby sings well but does not play an instrument while singing. Mr. O'Dette plays well but does not sing. As a musician who has recorded serveral frottole, I can tell you that what Ms. Rumsey does is not easy, but she makes it sound easy and lovely. Dr. M.G. Ceruiti, mezzosoprano, guitar, mandolin