(THIS ARTICLE IS MACHINE TRANSLATED by Google from Norwegian)
The Italian composer Giacomo Carissimi (1605-74) is only known today for the oratorio Jephthah. Le Parlement de Musique speaks this work on its new CD, while Concerto delle Donne shows that this central figure in the development of the oratory has more to offer.
Refined despair
When the Ammonites attacked Israel, Jephthah made a covenant with God: If he gave him victory against the enemy, the first who came out of his house and met him when he came home well, would be sacrificed as a burnt offering. He was met by his daughter.
Carissimi's oratorio based on biblical history is considered the first masterpiece of the Latin oratorio genre. Jephthah (c. 1650) is a work with simple instruments where expression and story telling are at the center, as opposed to melody and structure.
In contrast to that of Jephthah, Carissimi's life seems to have been relatively undramatic. He became chaplain at the German Jesuit Academy in Rome just 24 years old and remained there until his death. The job consisted of teaching music and organizing music in the church. He was regarded as the foremost oratorical composer of the time; the last choral part in Jephthah was especially admired, and it was used by Handel in his oratory Samson. Alessandro Scarlatti and Marc-Antoine Charpentier were among Carissimi's more famous students.
The French ensemble Le Parlement de Musique, on its latest release on Opus 111, has put together a program they have called "a spiritual concert in Rome ca. 1650 ». The ensemble, which was formed in 1990 by the conductor Martin Gester, is particularly interested in illuminating little-known works by well-known and unknown composers. Their performance of Jephthah appears as idiomatic through the ensemble's and soloists' combination of sophistication and expressiveness. In particular, the soprano Elisa Franzetti impresses in the role of her daughter.
The other two works by Carissimi on this CD, Lamentation of the damned og Congratulations beatorum, is not directly based on Bible texts, but is also sacred history, "Sacred Stories." In addition, the CD contains works by Carissimi's contemporary Lelio Colista and Girolamo Frescobaldi.
Tears for three
The English ensemble Concerto delle Donne consists of the three sopranos Donna Deam, Gill Ross and Elin Thomas, as well as Alistair Ross and David Miller on harpsichord and guitar. The ensemble was formed to perform Italian music from the 1500th and 1600th centuries written for three sopranos. It was Duke Alfonso of Ferrara who put together the first concert of women of the best sopranos of all time, and there is a wealth of music written for this rare ensemble, especially by Carissimi.
On his first CD on Signum, called cry ("Crying") after the cantata Weep, alas weep, Concerto delle Donne deals with motets and cantatas by Carissimi, of which only one has been recorded before. The secular cantatas here are written for concerts at the court of Kristina of Sweden, who arrived in Rome in 1655.
This music, and especially the one that is for three equal voices, can at first listening give an impression of monotony and uniformity, which is not counteracted by the ensemble only using harpsichord and guitarrone as accompaniment. However, this is music that grows as one enters it on its own terms. It is a problem that the sound image is a bit hollow and narrow and has too little dynamics. By the way, this is the only thing I have to complain about on this CD. The three sopranos have beautiful, pure voices, and the interpretations are completely convincing in terms of phrasing, tempo and dynamics.
Both of these CDs are very good introductions to this undeservedly underexposed composer.
