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Track(s) taken from CDA66908

Canzon septimi toni a 12, C182

composer
1597; No 13 of Sacrae Symphoniae

His Majestys Sagbutts & Cornetts
Recording details: March 1997
St Jude-on-the-Hill, Hampstead Garden Suburb, London, United Kingdom
Produced by Mark Brown
Engineered by Antony Howell & Julian Millard
Release date: September 1997
Total duration: 2 minutes 51 seconds
 

Other recordings available for download

Gabrieli Players, Paul McCreesh (conductor)

Reviews

‘This superb disc … is the very essence of La Serenissima. Masterly performances, alive with authentic detail’ (BBC Music Magazine)

‘Excellent. The playing is fluent and exhilarating. An excellent recording. The notes are exemplary’ (Classic CD)

‘Magnificent. The range of color, breadth and depth of sonority and the majestic nobility of the composer's conception are all revealed in a manner even the most expert of modern brass players could not possibly emulate. A superlative disc and a real credit to everyone involved’ (Fanfare, USA)

«L'ensemble anglais est aujourd'hui au sommet de son art» (Répertoire, France)
The 1615 collection of Gabrieli’s canzonas and sonatas would conclude with a revolutionary work, a sonata for three violins and organ in which the increasingly elaborate sonorities of the polychoral canzona are abandoned in favour of the simple, continuo-accompanied textures of Baroque chamber music. Yet the seeds of this development were already present in earlier works, and the present canzona is, despite the opulence of its scoring for three four-part choirs, in essence a work for three treble instruments, each with its own three-part accompaniment.

The three trebles (violins in our performance) exchange short melodic tags, all clichés of the canzona style. The harmony and rhythm are simple and the effect predominantly lyrical. Monotony, to which lesser composers succumbed all too easily in this kind of piece, is avoided by the unpredictability of the conversation; new ideas are instigated by all three choirs at different times, and are echoed sometimes once, sometimes twice.

The musical content is at times reminiscent of No 3, though here the vigour of the 7th mode is tempered by what Zarlino described as the ‘natural grace and sweetness’ of the 8th.

from notes by Timothy Roberts © 1997

Other albums featuring this work

A New Venetian Coronation, 1595
Studio Master: SIGCD287Download onlyStudio Master FLAC & ALAC downloads available
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