Listeners who may have seen this title and wondered why they never knew
Monteverdi
wrote a
Vespro di Natale
(or "Christmas Vespers") can relax; what's heard here is not a
composition but music from a hypothetical Christmas service over which he might have presided at St. Mark's cathedral in Venice. One can debate historical performance practice endlessly, but
left a good deal of written evidence as to how he wanted his ensembles to sound. The historical-instrument ensemble
La Cetra Basel
and its director,
Andrea Marcon
, attempt here to produce a performance according to those instructions. This is a highly worthwhile exercise, and
Marcon
and company do a lot of things right. First, they don't try to record the music at St. Mark's, a notoriously difficult acoustic environment; the recording was made at the Museo Santa Caterina in Treviso, and it sounds great. Second, while musicologists may debate the precise meanings of
's instructions, the musical results are solid. The ensemble is large, with a choir of about 20 that achieves a rich sound with good text intelligibility and a nice grasp of the festive Christmas tone of the Baroque. Third, and perhaps most important,
's program holds together. Incorporating well-known pieces by
and others, with the
Selva morale e spirituale
set by
being the largest source, but there are also unknown composers here, like
Giovanni Valentini
, whose
Hodie Christus natus est
is a joyous Christmas piece, and
Francesco Usper
, and these flow naturally. An ideal holiday-season find or gift for the
lover. ~ James Manheim