Requiem

Description

After the great success of their first album for Arcana, dedicated to two unpublished masterpieces by Pergolesi, which earned them a "Diapason Découverte," Giulio Prandi and the Coro e Orchestra Ghislieri return with a recording dedicated to the Requiem by Niccolò Jommelli. Composed in 1756 for the funeral of the mother of the Duke of Württemberg, it became the most popular Requiem in Europe until 1791, the year Mozart composed his. Jommelli's work, which is sure to surprise even the most knowledgeable enthusiasts of this repertoire, is characterized by a luminous intimacy that does not rely on imposing and spectacular effects but focuses on vocal beauty and subtle musical storytelling. The voices of Sandrine Piau and Carlo Vistoli are at the heart of an architecture in which the choir fits into an iridescent contrapuntal texture that fully exploits the expertise the composer acquired during his years in Venice and Rome. The result of a long research process, this recording is based on a new critical edition that for the first time has produced a complete and coherent score of the Requiem, in which sections of plainchant are integrated, thus restoring the musical balance desired by Jommelli and offered to the work's first listeners.