The Beauty Of Monteverdi
Towering above the late Renaissance and early Baroque, Claudio Monteverdi was called the “Shakespeare of music” by John Eliot Gardiner, whose recordings feature in this cross-section of the Italian master's most important sacred and secular works. In both realms, says Gardiner – singling out L'Orfeo, opera's first masterpiece – Monteverdi conveys “the whole range of human emotions”.
Paul McCreesh, one of the album's other authoritative Monteverdi conductors, used the words “dazzling”, “breathtaking” and “electrifying” to describe another of its highlights, the glorious Vespers of 1610. Monteverdi's sensuous melodies, harmonies and spellbinding rhythms also typify the other works of genius performed here by some of early music's finest singers and players.