Cheap Giaches de Wert: La Gerusalemme Liberata (Music) (Giaches de Wert, La Venexiana) Price

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Customer Reviews of Giaches de Wert: La Gerusalemme Liberata

Simply extraordinary
I have been listening to madrigal performances for perhaps forty years. La Venexiana is the best group I have ever heard, and this cd is surely one of their best. Their singing is stunningly clear and elegant, but it is also deeply and convincingly expressive. All of these qualities are enhanced by the quality of the recording itself. I wouldn't hesitate to recommend this to anyone with even the slightest interest in early music. Indeed, I would recommend it anyone with a serious interest in music of almost any kind.

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A reference point amongst madrigal recordings
Giaches de Wert (1535 - 1596) was of Flemish origin but moved to Italy as a choirboy at a young age. Throughout his life he maintained a certain Flemishness to his style of composition while showing a keen awareness of the trends amongst other madrigalists of his age such as Marenzio, Monteverdi, and Luzzaschi. La Gerusalemme Liberata (Gerusalem Liberated) refers to the setting here of poems by Tasso portraying the vissitudes of the two protagonists of the tale, Erminia and Armida, although that said the text here mainly come from Battista Guarini's Il Pastor Fido. <
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>Rarely has a single CD ever had so much unconditional praise heaped upon it so unanimously by so many reviewers. La Venexiana are increasingly consolidating their reputation as the leading madrigal singers on record. For a start they have the substantial advantage of singing in their mother tongue of Italian - so important when so often the 'parlato' rhetorical style of singing dominates as it does here, as it often did amongst Flemish composers - whereas the Italians of his time frequently explored a more chromatic style. Amongst the accolades it has received include the coveted Goldberg music magazine five star rating, as well as the highest possible ratings from Diapason, La Monde de la Musique, Répertoire, and Classica. Klassik-heute (the online German magazine) also gives it a 9/10 rating. <
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>Maricarmen Gomez in Goldberg wrote: <
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>"The style with which La Venexiana performs these is extraordinary, emphasising, in a special way, the moderate tempo which allows the music calmly to reach us and allows us to enjoy all the nuances of music and text that were right at the vanguard in its day. This recording is exemplary in all areas and is worthy of becoming a point of reference for enthusiasts of the madrigal genre." <
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>The singing here as always from La Venexiana is refined to the extremes and utterly exquisite, capable of being both lyrical and declamatory according to the needs of the text. The recording quality is also excellent capturing the timbre of the vocalists' voices nicely. This is increasingly looking like it may become a yardstick against which all other recordings of madrigals will be measured.