YLVA POZZER Soprano 
SIMONETTA CAVALLI Mezzosoprano 
VINCENZO DI DONATO Tenore 
GARRICK COMEAUX Basso

MONICA PELLICIARI Violino 
ELISA IMBALZANO Violino 
DANIELE CERNUTO Violoncello 
PIETRO PROSSER Tiorba

ACCADEMIA DI MUSICA ANTICA 
ENSEMBLE VOCALE E STRUMENTALE DI ROVERETO 
ROMANO VETTORI ORGANO E CONCERTAZIONE

1 Ave Maris Stella
per Alto, Tenore, Basso, 2 violini, tiorba,Basso continuo (organo) 5.57

2 Ave regina
per Tenore, Basso, basso continuo (organo) 4.49

3 Regina coeli laetare
per Alto, Tenore, Basso, basso continuo (organo) 4.08

4 Laetatus sum
per Alto, Tenore, Basso, 2 violini, violoncino, basso continuo (organo, tiorba) 9.01

5 Sonata à 3
per due violini, violoncino, basso continuo (organo, tiorba) 5.24

6 Exultet orbis gaudiis
per Canto, Alto, Tenore Basso, due violini, violoncino, basso continuo (organo, tiorba) 5.02

7 Beatus vir
per Alto, Tenore, Basso, 2 violini, violoncino, basso continuo (organo, tiorba) 11.28

8 Iesu corona virginum
per Alto, Tenore, Basso, 2 violini, violoncino, basso continuo (organo, tiorba) 4.40

9 Deus tuorum militum
per Alto, Tenore, Basso, 2 violini, violoncino, basso continuo (organo) 3.53

10 Nisi Dominus
per Canto, Alto, Tenore Basso, due violini, violoncino, basso continuo (organo, tiorba)

Conceived, recorded and produced by Giulio Cesare Ricci
Recorded at Church of San Bernardino in Crema (CR)
Recording date    April 2002
Organ   Giorgio Carli 1989
Equipment: tube microphones Neumann U47, U48, M4, advanced mike pre-amplifiers, line cables, digital, microphone and power supply Signoricci
Recorded in stereo DSD with the Pyramix recorder using dCS A/D and D/A converters.

THE SACRED MUSIC IN THE CD
 «Il mio genio è stato sempre lontano dalle stampe»
 («My genius has always kept away from prints») We can assume that Cavalli avoided, perhaps for excessive modesty, to pursue an adequate dissemination of his works in prints, if in the preface to his anthology of Sacred Music of 1656 he said: « My genius has always kept away from prints, and I have more quickly consented to let my weaknesses go where Fortune brought them by means of the pen, rather than the press. In the end, however, I let myself be convinced…». Venice was the goal of pupils and musicians coming from all over Europe; Schütz refined there his polychoral style, and his mixed concertato for small choir. To this particular field is dedicated a conspicuous part of Cavalli’s anthology, from which the pieces presented in this CD have been chosen and which, on top of showing the ingenuous composer’s traits, store exquisite vocal and instrumental surprises. The reference to Monteverdi is due, particularly in the harmonic conduct and the structural cut which is fundamentally based on the text. In relation to this model Cavalli shows, however, a greater concision and a more accentuated rhythmical-syllabic articulation. The alternation between binary and ternary metre is widely exploited, with both an expressive purpose, in order to follow the affect of the text, and a more general structural purpose. So, the same arioso recitative which evokes early century opera opens the “Ave regina coelorum” by creating a progressively diffractive lyrical climate, rhythmically marked by the frequent textual repetitions in concerted imitation, and introducing a festive ternary section (“Gaude, gaude”). The voices are mostly treated according to the concertato rather than the polyphonic principle; however, if on the one side they show their origin in the early Northern Italian Baroque (from Monteverdi to Viadana of the Ecclesiastical Concerti), on the other side they are organized thanks to a new function of the basso continuo, often schematised in rhythmic progressions like the ostinato bass or, in any case, more clearly harmonic. The organization of the phrases and sections becomes tighter and rhetorically oriented with repetitions and semantic accumulations of various entity (“Regina coeli laetare”). The inevitably more articulated compositions, because of the length of the texts, are the psalms (“Beatus vir”, “Laetatus sum”, “Nisi Dominus”), where all Cavalli’s technical devices come to the surface, including the solo recitative, albeit in the still free form of almost «recitar cantando», only more phraseologically schematic. The composer also uses the concitato Monteverdi style (“peccator videbit et irascetur” in the “Beatus vir”) to which he adds the instruments, which normally anticipate or echo the themes of the voices sometimes with the ritornello technique, and other times by intersecting more thickly with them. From the harmonic point of view Cavalli’s language appears often advanced and expressively scrupulous (see the passage to the “Gloria Patri” in “Laetatus sum”, or the ante litteram expressionism of the highly dissonant piece “qui manducat! is pan em doloris” in the “Nisi Dominus”). Cavalli does not hesitate to use particular metrical procedures to underline dramatic textual passages (6/4 in the “non confundetur” again in “Nisi Dominus”), without forgetting madrigalistic effects and various coloraturas connected to the text (“surgite”, “sicut sagittae” in “Nisi Dominus”, “iucundus”, “peribit” in “Beatus vir”). Cavalli introduces in the “Laetatus sum” a wide passage of great dramatic effect, reachable perhaps only through the modalities and techniques of the sacred genre, which expresses the emotion of the pilgrims at the sight of the holy city (“stantes erant pedes nostri in atriis tuis Jerusalem”). Other more lyrical moments and many ternary sections recall the features of opera arias and duets (finales of the “Laetatus sum” and of “Nisi Dominus”). In relation to the Marian antiphons and the psalms, differently structured and variously constructed, an apparently more simplistic, but in reality more intimately lyrical and expressive attitude can be instead noted in the intonation of the hymns: invariably cut in the repetitive strophic form that is already part of the ecclesiastical hymnodical repertory, Cavalli alternates the verses among the various soloists and the simple instrumental ritornelli, but with a variety and an exploitation of the peculiarities of the harmonic Gregorian modes of great effect. So in “Exultet orbis gaudiis” (in the E mode), he assigns the strophes in sequence to each soloist, then to a duet, and he finally joins them to the tutti in the wide final lacework; in the “Iesu corona virginum” he opens with tutti, continues with the solos and closes again with voices and instruments together, like in “Ave maris stella” in which he also recuperates the Gregorian tonality of the hymn (D mode). The simplest of all, “Deus tuorum militum”, ingeniously marries the regularity of strophic repetitions (while breaking, however, the verses in the single hemistichs assigned to the various soloists) with the festive and captivating support of the strophic bass and the instrumental ritornelli. In the group of instrumental pieces which completes the collection of Sacred Music (their function in the liturgical praxis was to substitute the Gregorian chant), the only three-part sonata (actually four-part, because of the violoncino autonomous part in relation to the basso continuo) in the index of the basso continuo as well as on the other parts is also called «canzona»; in fact, with its dactylic incipit, it is indebted to the Venetian song of the 16th century. It also presents sections following one another in which one can perceive a more mature writing and a driven instrumental virtuosity, which bears full comparison with the development of 16th century sonata, while, at the same time, closing with a yearning ciaccona, built on a “di lamento” bass (the descending Phrygian tetrachord), in which Cavalli’s great skills as an opera composer emerge once again. To explain clearly and within the pieces included in this recording, the index has been reported as results from the Tavola of the Through Bass. The most significant differences in the indications put to the single parts have been reported in the footnote.
1. Hymno. Ave maris stella, à 3      2. Ave regina, à 2. Tenore, e Basso    3. Regina coeli, à 3. Alto, Tenore, e Basso     4. Laetatus à 3. A. T. e B. con due Violini, & tre Viole se piace 
5. Sonata à 3      6. Hymno. Exultet orbis à 4. C. A.T. e B. con Violini       7. Beatus à 3. Alto Tenore, e Basso, con Violini, e Violoncino        8. Hymno. Iesu corona virginum à 3. A. T. e B., con Violini 
9. Hymno. Deus tuorum militum à 3. A. T. e B. con Violini       10. Nisi à 4. C. A.T. e B., con Violini e Violoncino 
[Romano Vettori]