RINALDO ALESSANDRINI & CONCERTO ITALIANO

The prestigious Concerto Italiano, a vocal and instrumental ensemble that has spent almost four decades playing sublime Early Music, is coming to Bilbao with their touching project devoted to Monteverdi. Led by their founder and conductor Rinaldo Alessandrini, the group will perform works by Monteverdi and Italian composers from his milieu including works such as Duettos from Monteverdi’s 7th Book of Madrigals, Arias by Scherzi Musicali and selected scenes from “L’incoronazione di Poppea”.

Rinaldo Alessandrini is an internationally renowned harpsichordist, organist and pianist, who has not only enjoyed a successful career in Early Music conducting the Concerto Italiano for forty years, but he also performs as a soloist at festivals all over the world. Concerto Italiano was set up in 1984, as Early Music made a comeback in Italy. Monteverdi, Bach and Vivaldi became the group’s mainstays to renew the language of early music, revealing aesthetic and rhetoric aspects which were entirely new at that time. Over all these years, Concerto Italiano’s recordings have been considered benchmark versions. The ensemble has played in theatres, auditoriums and festivals all over the world.

Concerto Italiano devised the Monteverdi trilogy at the Teatro alla Scala in Milan and in the Paris National Opera, conducted by Bob Wilson between 2009 and 2016. It has received outstanding awards such as four Gramophone Awards (1994, 1998, 2002 and 2004), and three awards from the German recording critics, a Cini Award, five awards at the Midem in Cannes, plus two Records of the Year (1998 and 2005) and Recording of the Year for Amadeus (1998), among others. In 2002, it received the Abbiati Award for its entire body of work.

PROGRAM

Claudio Monteverdi

– “L’incoronazione di Poppea” atto primo, scena terza. Poppea e Nerone “Signor, deh non partire” (Venezia 1643)
– “Non è di gentil core” a due soprani (Concerto. Settimo Libro de’ Madrigali. Venezia 1619)
– “Quel sguardo sdegnosetto” a voce sola (Scherzi musicali. Venezia 1632)
– “Oh come sei gentile” a due soprani (Concerto. Settimo Libro de’ Madrigali. Venezia 1619)
– “L’incoronazione di Poppea” atto secondo scena quinta. Nerone e Lucano “Or che Cesare è morto” (Venezia 1643)
– “O viva fiamma” a due soprani (Concerto. Settimo Libro de’ Madrigali. Venezia 1619)
– “Si dolce è’l tormento” a voce sola (Venezia 1624)
– “Lo son pur vezzosetta pastorella” a due soprani (Concerto. Settimo Libro de’ Madrigali. Venezia 1619)
– “Ohimè ch’io cado” a voce sola (Venezia 1624)
– Romanesca “Ohimè dov’è il mio ben” a due soprani (Concerto. Settimo Libro de’ Madrigali. Venezia 1619)
– “Et è pur dunque vero” a voce sola (Scherzi musicali. Venezia 1632)
– “L’incoronazione di Poppea” atto terzo scena quinta. Poppea e Nerone “Signor, or rinasco” (Venezia 1643)