Luogo e data di registrazione		Bennebroek (Holland) - 6/9 Dicembre 1967
	Registrazione: live / studio		studio
	Producer		Wolf Erichson
	Prima Edizione LP		Telefunken "Das Alte Werk" | SAWT 9525-B | 1 LP - durata 51' 03" | (p) 1968 | ANA
	Edizione CD		Warner Classics | LC 04281 | 2564-69671-9 | 1 CD - durata 51' 03"  | (c) 2008 | ADD
	Cover		Gerard Terborch (1617-1681) "Das Konzert".
	Note		-

When, shortly before 1600, attempts were made in humanistic cultured circles in Florence to revive the drama of classical antiquity through accompanied solo singing, the participants little suspected what developments they were thereby initiating. Already in 1607 from these fumbling experiments sprang Monteverdi’s first real opera Orfeo, and a little later efforts were being made throughout Europe to produce sacred and secular songs for a single voice in the most diverse forms. Since composers of various countries started out from very different bases and distinct national ideas and traditions, the 17th-century baroque song shows a diversity such as it never again attained later. The word “song” should not, of course, be taken in a narrow sense or understood simply as a species like the German solo lied of Schubert or Schumann. The baroque “song” in its widest sense includes dramatic monodies as well as cantata arias, dance- and folk-type songs, in forms ranging from the most straightforward strophic setting to large operatic scenas. Adam Krieger (1634-1666)) and Heinrich Albert (1604-1651) rank as the most important composers of the German continuo song. Krieger’s arias, mostly to his own texts, are simple folk-like songs which have the semblance of familiarity. They are marked by significant melodic invention, uniform motivic shape and richly modulating harmony. The individual strophes are linked together by five-part polyphonic orchestral ritornellos of an older style, undoubtedly an echo of early baroque concerto practice. The swinging melodic line of the song Der Unbestand ist ihr verwandt (“Inconstancy is her kin”) musically characterises the fluctuating favour of the beloved. The melancholy mood-content of the deeply-felt text of Der Liebe Macht (“The power of love”) is perfectly captured in its solemn style. Der Rheinsche Wein tanzt gar zu fein (“Rhenish wine dances all too fine”), a life-affirming, merry drinking song, is kept fresh and light in dance rhythm. Albert’s songs, highly esteemed by his contemporaries, maintain their special importance by having been produced in association with the Königsberg circle of poets around Simon Dach, whose texts reflect simple sentiments, a feeling for nature and a sober worldly joy, and are rooted in the soil of genuine experience. The poem Waldgesang (“Woodland song”), overshadowed by sadness, is set to music in the simplest form. The melodic and harmonic climaxes coincide exactly with the words “Traurigkeit beiseite tun” (“I shall put aside the sorrow”) of the first strophe. Lob der Freundschaft (“In praise of friendship”) is set in gay changeable rhythm. The familiar Vorjahrsliedchen (“Old year’s ditty”) of Simon Dach belongs, in Albert’s folk-like setting, to the most popular song creations of the 17th century. The Serenade of Heinrich Franz Biber (1644-1704) belongs to the special form, popular in the high baroque period, of processional suites, the forerunners of the later divertimenti and cassations. An intrada and ritirada enclose a free series of dance pieces of which a chaconne forms the central point. In it, a favourite Italian chaconne bass accompanied by strings pizzicato and without continuo is coupled with the German nightwatchman’s call “Hört ihr Herrn und lasst euch sagen” (“Listen folk and mark the hour”), The whole composition has the character of a serenade. In the sphere of the sacred German song the pieces of Nikolaus Hasse (c. 1617-1672) stand out: his Geistliche Seelenmusik (1659) on texts by the theologian Heinrich Müller and the mystic Angelus Silesius reveals a sure predilection for an exaggeratedly individual expression of piety. While Meine Seele, willst du ruhn (“O my soul, if you want rest”) is completely indebted to the folk-like Protestant devotional song, the setting of O Ewigkeit (“O eternity”) shows a close onomatopoetic link to the individual words, which is further reinforced in the piece Ich wall auf Erden (“I travel to and fro”). Words like “wall” (“travel”) and “Schiff” (“ship”) are given extended musical coloration, and are characteristic of the mystic immersion in the intellectual content of the text. In contrast to this is Erbarm dich mein, o Herre Gott (“Have mercy, O Lord”) by Heinrich Schütz (1585-1672), which is of touching simplicity. After a short introductory instrumental sinfonia the soloist begins with the sevenfold plea “Erbarm dich” (“Have mercy”). The confessional song renounces all suggestion of ornament and in this way allows the powerful words of the psalm to make their full impact. The composition represents the type of “Kleines geistliches Konzert” (“small sacred concert”) which was not directly associated with the liturgy of the divine service but belonged to the category of devotional music. The English baroque song is represented by Henry Purcell (1659-1695) with three songs of very diverse form. The “Orpheus Britannicus” set Fly swift, ye hours (1692) in the form of a solo madrigal in five parts with strongly contrasted sections. The pictorial interpretation of the amatory text is shown by realistic representation of the words “fly”, “move” and “pleasing pain”. The father brave, a birthday song for the Duke of Gloucester, is an English “ayre” in marked rhythm with lyrical passages. Return, revolting rebels too shows a ternary aria form. In it the rebels are adjured to reflect. The French air is represented by two songs each by the artistically versatile Dutchman Constantijn Huygens (1596-1687) and the French court composer Jean-Baptiste Lully (1632-1687). Huygen’s humorous settings of his own texts in the Sérénade and Quoy Clorinde, tu pars? (“So, Klorinda, you are going?”) are marked by a very sentimental melodic line, scrupulous attention to the relation of words and notes and bold harmonic progressions. They come from his collection Pathodia sacra et profana published in Paris in 1647. With Lully’s two pastoral songs we are dealing with song-like arias such as found their way into his numerous operas. Lightly thrown off, plain and simple in expression, they are the outward sign of that bucolic masquerade to which Louis XIV’s courtly society willingly gave itself up in order to while away the time. In contrast to the French songs are the Italian, artistically substantially more exacting, and mostly highly dramatic. Alessandro Scarlatti (1660-1725) is represented here by a mournful “ombra” song, which, elevated to a type and expanded into a scena, enjoyed the greatest popularity in 18th-century Neapolitan opera seria until Mozart’s Lucio Silla. The vocal line, declaimed with great expression and accompanied only by the strings, moves diatonically for the most part, without any decoration. The universally gifted Agostino Steffani (1654-1728) succeeded, in his solo cantata Lagrime dolorose (“Tears of anguish”), in combining the multi-voiced older compositional technique with the bel canto of the time. To the two polyphonic instrumental parts over a supporting bass is added the solo vocal line, which in this piece is pictorially rich in coloratura, in accordance with the grievously distressed text. Francesca Caccini (1581-c. 1640), a celebrated woman singer and composer of the early 17th century, provides in O che nuovo stupor (“O what new wonder”) a glimpse into the beginnings of monody. Her Christmas aria, published in 1618, which joyfully proclaims the birth of Christ, is a melodically rich, embellished song of unusual artistic effect. It makes abundantly clear the artistic heights reached by the early Italian solo song. Lothar Hoffmann-Erbrecht