‘This music is already familiar from other recordings of Venetian vespers, yet these are magisterial performances, the Christmas setting giving them an appropriately festive focus’ (Early Music)

‘One of the glories of the new disc is the gloriously full-toned and marvelously projected singing of his two sopranos, Carolyn Sampson and Rebecca Outram … A further distinct plus is Hyperion's superb engineering, which presents the performances with glowing, yet sharply defined immediacy’ (Fanfare, USA)

‘This is life-enhancing stuff, breathtakingly exciting at times, exquisitely beautiful at others. If King and his forces maintain the standard they set here, this series is surely set to be the definitive representation of Monteverdi on disc’ (BBC Music Magazine)

‘The King's Consort shows complete affinity with both the dramatic and the lyrical aspects of Monteverdi's style. No ensemble could be better suited to this magnificent undertaking’ (The Daily Telegraph)

«En effet, c'est avec un tact et une finesse sans précédent que King mène son corpus instrumental … la douceur séraphique de Sampson et Outram dans le Venite, Siccientes n'a d'équivalent que la parfaite maîrise de la diction, des sons enflés et de la souplesse de ces voix» (Classica, France)

‘This is an absolutely crack team of soloists, all of whom are completely at home in Monteverdi's idiom. The tenors in particular luxuriate in the ornamental roulades’ (Early Music)

‘Where this new disc really comes into its own is in the small-scale motets, where King's outstanding roster of soloists would be exceedingly difficult to better … The rarely performed motets alone should ensure the present disc its place in any Monteverdi collection, while John Whenham's notes prove as valuable an asset as those Michael Talbot provided for King's Vivaldi sacred music traversal’ (Fanfare, USA)

‘I'll say it straight out: the result is truly exciting! The music is magnificent, and so is the interpretation … the architecture of the programme is particularly remarkable, and the album is built on balance, variety, contrast’ (Goldberg)

‘Monteverdi is one of those composers who really does merit a complete recording of his output. The sacred works have been a little neglected, and this splendid new series, with its informed and intelligent booklet notes, is putting things right’ (BBC Music Magazine)

‘There are joys here to melt icebergs … I want Volume 3 immediately’ (The Times)

‘Sumptuous surround sound and full-blooded performances from Robert King and Co combine to thrilling effect in the second release in their fabulous Monteverdi cycle’ (Classic FM Magazine)

‘This is another fine issue to add to a series that has now firmly established its credentials as yet one more (brilliently plumed) feather in the respective caps of King and Hyperion’ (Fanfare, USA)