Customer Reviews

Strozzi: Sacri Musicali Affetti; Gianoncelli, etc. / Kiehr, Concerto Soave

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... but if that's the only way you can get to hear this superlative recording, well, wash your ears and do it! The available CDs here on amazon are priced to punish collectors. You could always look at other sellers, of course.

Born in Venice, Barbara Strozzi (1619-1677) was the adopted daughter of the poet Giulio Strozzi. It's always been rumored that Barbara was in fact Giulio's illegitimate child by his housekeeper Isabella Garzon. In any case, Giulio energetically fostered the girl Barbara's development as a singer, and when she began to show aptitude as a composer, he arranged for her to study with the sensationally popular opera composer Francesco Cavalli. There were rumors also that Strozzi was a "courtesan" but in truth she led a reasonably quiet though eccentric life. She never married but it's likely that she conceived her four children all with the same father, Giovanni Vidman. As passionately distraught as many of her madrigals are in affect, Strozzi seems to have been remarkably prudent as a businesswoman, one who managed her own investments cannily enough to support herself comfortably. She was almost unique in the number and the success of her self-publications of her music in single-composer volumes, rather than in collections. She was said to be "the most prolific composer of printed secular vocal music in Venice in the Middle of the century." Her output is also unique in that it only contains secular vocal music, with the exception of one volume of sacred songs.

This recording, by Concerto Soave, features selections from that single opus of sacred songs, and it is music of such excellence that one has to regret that Strozzi never had occasion to compose on a larger scale, an opera perhaps, or an oratorio. It seems, however, that all of Strozzi's compositions, including these, were steadfastly intended for her own performances and conceived for her own talents as a soprano singer. Strozzi may have learned much from Cavalli, but her music is completely unlike his. Instead, it draws inspiration from the previous generation of "seconda prattica" madrigalists -- Monteverdi, d'India, Luigi Rossi, and others. These "sacred madrigals" are every bit as chromatic and impassioned as Strozzi's secular works, and it's worh noting that they all focus on the emotions of the Virgin Mary.

Strozzi has become, it's fair to say, an icon of feminism and an inspiration to women musicians of our times. But she needs no feminist apologia; within the genre of the Baroque madrigal, she was as brilliant a composer as any of her peers. Her special genius is not unappreciated today; there are simply no poor performances of her music, only good to great ones. This recording is one of the greatest. Soprano Maria Cristina Kiehr has the perfect voice and the maximally polished technique to "channel" Strozzi's musical personality, and the instrumental continuo of Concerto Soave is precisely complementary to Kiehr's vocal interpretation, "suave" indeed when suavity is suitable but able to surge in intensity when the texts become fiery.

Kiehr and Concerto Soave have made some other CDs that are well worth splurging to acquire ...
Monteverdi: Pianto della Madonna
Bella Madre Dei Fiori
Il Canto Delle Dame
... but this might well be their finest effort!

I picked up this CD by accident one day, and it remains one of my all time favorites. Everything about this CD is top rate-the music and the production and the performances!