Luogo e data di registrazione		Studio Christuskirche, Berlin (Germania) - maggio 1974 - (Juditha triumphans) Wembley Town Hall, London (United Kingdom) - novembre 1996 - (Geistliche Musik) All Hallows, Gospel Oak, London (United Kingdom) - gennaio 1978 - (Motetti) San Marco, Venezia (Italia) - ottobre 1964 - (Vivaldi in San Marco I) San Marco, Venezia (Italia) - ottobre 1964 - (Vivaldi in San Marco II)
	Registrazione: live / studio		studio
	Producer / Engineer		-
	Prima Edizione originale LP		Philips - 6747 173 - (3 LP's) - durata 49' 52" | 50' 54" | 51' 55" - (p) 1975 - Analogico - (Juditha triumphans) Philips - 6700 116 - (2 LP's) - durata 47' 20" | 46' 44" - (p) 1977 - Analogico - (Geistliche Musik) Philips - 9500 556 - (1 LP) - durata 48' 08" - (p) 1978 - Analogico - (Motetti) Philips - 835 300 - (1 LP) - durata 49' 45" - (p) 1965 - Analogico - (Vivaldi in San Marco I) Philips - 835 301 - (1 LP) - durata 39' 42" - (p) 1965 - Analogico - (Vivaldi in San Marco II)
	Note		-

JUDITHA TRIUMPHANS The present recording (based on Vivaldi’s manuscript in possession of the National Library of Turin) contains the complete music of Vivaldi’s "Juditha triumphans," including the two alternative arias for Nos. 5 and 21 which are included here after the final chorus at the end of Side 6. The performers have followed Vivaldi’s musical indications even where they differ slightly from the order of the text as in the choruses Nos. 27 and 57. Vittorio Negri As a composer of instrumental music Antonio Vivaldi needs little introduction, for most of his 600-odd concertos and sonatas have been published in modern editions and a representative selection recorded. Increasingly the attention of scholars and performers is being drawn to his vocal output - operas, Cantatas, and sacred music. For a long time the existence of many of these works was unsuspected; only the fortunate discovery in the 1920’s of the Turin manuscripts, several volumes of which are devoted to Vivaldi’s sacred and secular vocal works, brought them to light. Even then, their revival was no straightforward matter, for the general undervaluing of Italian eighteenth-century vocal music (in comparison with that of the preceding two centuries), the suspension of much musical activity during the Second World War and, paradoxically, Vivaldi’s very renown as an instrumental composer all acted as obstacles. Although the second Vivaldi “renaissance,” concerned with his vocal music, is now well under way, as yet only the Gloria in D has attained the popularity of his best-known concertos. The oratorio “Juditha triumphans,” a work of somewhat different character as it is stylistically closer to Vivaldi’s operas than to the more austere liturgical tradition with which the Gloria maintains strong connexions, deserves to gain fresh converts, for it shows the composer at the peak of his inventiveness. Vivaldi is known to have written three oratorios on the subjects of Moses (1714), Judith (1716), and the Adoration of the Magi (1722), the first two having Latin texts and the last a vernacular text. Although employed at the Ospedale della Pietà (one of four Venetian orphanages in which girls received expert musical tuition) as a violin teacher from 1703, he frequently deputised for the choir master Francesco Gasparini after the latter went on sick leave in 1713. One of the choir master’s tasks was to provide music for the frequent concerts or services with music open to the public held in the Pietà’s chapel. Oratorio was a favourite form, for it lent a moral purpose to musical enjoyment, simultaneously gratifying the Pietà’s pious benefactors and the less reverent members of the cosmopolitan audience. Oratorio librettos - that for “Juditha triumphans” is by one Giacomo Cassetti - retold biblical stories in their own fashion, deleting and adding details with some freedom, albeit with more respect for scriptural authority than most opera librettos had for historical or mythological accuracy! The story of Judith from the Apocrypha was a popular oratorio subject, perhaps because the two central characters could be so easily identified with stock operatic types - Judith herself with the virtuous yet shrewd heroine, and Holofernes with the blustering tyrant tamed by the power of love. Cassetti severely prunes the story by making Ozias a high priest instead of a governor of Bethulia (and assigning to him something of the function of Joakim, the High Priest of Jerusalem) and by altogether omitting Achior, the Ammonite leader. The background to Judith’s visit to the Assyrian camp is provided sketchily. In compensation, Judith’s maid Abra (an invented name) and Holofernes’s servant Bagoas (Vagaus) assume more important roles, becoming confidants instead of mere auxiliaries. The lines beginning “Hic decreto aeterno Veneti maris Urbem” sung by Ozias before the final chorus contain an interesting topical reference. In 1714 Venice had entered into her sixth war with the Turks. By equating Venice with Judith and Turkish might with Holofernes, Cassetti turns the oratorio into a prayer for victory. Victory, alas, was not to be, for although the Treaty of Passarowitz (1718) consolidated Venetian possessions in Dalmatia it acknowledged the loss of virtually the whole Peloponnese, gained from Turkey 19 years earlier. At the original performance Vivaldi’s five vocal soloists were quite naturally all inmates of the Pietà. (A female Holofernes, Ozias, and Vagaus would not have surprised audiences already accustomed to the singing of male operatic roles by women.) When revising the score, possibly for a revival, Vivaldi composed completely new settings of two of Vagaus’s arias, designating them for a “Sig.ra Barbara,” and indicated by means of cues the insertion of further arias for Vagaus and Ozias of which the music is lost. A four-part chorus of mixed voices represents Assyrian warriors and Bethulian maidens impartially; the tenors and basses were possibly recruited for the occasion from St. Mark’s, or they may have been drawn from the Pieta’s teachers. Although it includes no instruments not found in his concertos, the orchestra must be one of the largest and most varied in composition Vivaldi ever assembled for a single performance. Discounting continuo instruments, it comprises two trumpets with timpani, two flauti (modern flutes are used here), two oboes (one as soloist), two clarens (either clarinets or, as here, trumpets, the interpretation is in dispute), salmoé (an obsolete woodwind instrument whose exact nature is still disputed), viola d’amore, a consort of five viole all’inglese (obsolete cousins of the violin family possessing sympathetic strings like the viola d’amore which is used here with three violas, cello, and violone), mandolin, four theorboes (in two parts) and solo organ, besides the usual orchestral strings. The number of players is likely to have been considerably smaller than the number of instruments, however, as the same player would double on several instruments. From the fact that flutes, oboes, and clarens never play together, for example, one may deduce that the same pair of players served for all three instruments. All Vivaldi’s choruses save the first, a da Capo movement, are in binary form with instrumental ritornelli. Except for “Vivat in pace,” the arias follow the da capo pattern. Their uniformity of construction is offset by enormous variety of instrumentation, key, tempo, metre, and general style, all these factors contributing to the particular affetto (mood) of the aria and hence to the characterisation. The association of instruments or tone colours with individual characters is less systematic than one is accustomed to in later music, but its beginnings can clearly be seen in the reservation of the softer and sweeter colours - those of the salmoé and the viola d’amore - for Judith’s arias. There is variety in the recitatives too; both Judith and Ozias have accompagnato recitatives, and the recitative during which Judith beheads Holofernes contains effective instrumental interjections. The many corrections in Vivaldi’s autograph score (“O servi, volate” began life as a plain continuo aria!) attest to the care and imagination he brought to the writing of “Juditha triumphans.” Like Verdi’s Requiem, and for similar reasons, it deserves to be rated as its composer’s best opera.” Michael Talbot MUSIC FOR TWO CHOIRS AND TWO ORCHESTRAS Since the priesthood offered security, education, and the possibility of advancement for the humble-born, it was quite natural that Antonio Vivaldi`s parents had their eldest son tonsured at the age of 15; but either because of the ailment (possibly asthma) which troubled him from birth, or his total involvement with music, he ceased to say Mass soon after his ordination in March 1703 - a lapse which was to earn the displeasure of the Papal legate of Ferrara 35 years later, when he forbade the composer entry into that city to direct the opera. Vivaldi`s musical training, centred on the study of the violin, had a distinctly secular bias, so that when, in September 1703, he joined the staff of the Ospedale della Pietà, one of Venice`s four "conservatoires" for girls, his post was that of violin master; the composition and direction of sacred vocal music remained the province of the Pietà`s choirmaster, Francesco Gasparini. This versatile musician, who was one of Venice`s most prolific and successful composers of opera and wrote an important treatise on keyboard accompaniment, was doubtless often absent from his duty. When King Frederik IV of Denmark and Norway attended a service in the Pietà`s chapel in December 1708, it was observed that the Credo and Agnus Dei were directed by a deputy - who may well have been Vivaldi. The opportunity to compose sacred vocal works for the Pietà came to him almost by accident. In April 1713 Gasparini obtained sick leave and permission to leave Venice for a period of six months, provided that he continued to supply new works for the chapel. Not only did Gasparini apparently fail to carry out this task, but he settled permanently in Rome, where he held a number of important posts. His interim replacement, Pietro Dall`Oglio, was no composer, so Vivaldi had to step into the breach. The Pietà`s maestro di coro was required, according to a memorandum of 1710, to compose a minimum of two Mass and Vespers settings annually (one for Easter and the other for the feast of the Visitation of the Blessed Virgin, to whom the institution was dedicated), as well as at least two motets every month, plus whatever occasional compositions might be required for funerals, the offices of Holy Week, etc.. Our composer matched up to his new task so well that on June 2, 1715 the governors voted him a special emolument of 50 ducats (his annual salary was 60 ducats!) in respect of his provision of "a complete Mass, a Vespers, an oratorio [presumably the lost ‘Moyses Deus Pharaonis`], over 30 motets, and others works." He probably continued to supply further works of the same kind until the appointment of Carlo Pietro Grua as choirmaster in February 1719. Thereafter, his contributions presumably fell, as a rule, in the interregna between the death or departure of one maestro di coro and the appointment of another; such periods lay between March and May 1726, and September 1737 and August 1739. As his reputation as a composer of sacred vocal music grew, Vivaldi received commissions from outside the Pietà. It is known, for instance, that a lost Te Deum by him was sung at the wedding of Louis XV and the Polish princess Maria Leszczyńska in September 1725. Works preserved in libraries situated in present-day Poland and Czechoslovakia hint at commissions from Saxony or the Empire. A recently-discovered inventory drawn up by the Bohemian composer Jan Dismas Zelenka, who must have met Vivaldi during his sojourn in Venice in 1716, establishes that the latter`s Magnilicat belonged to the Dresden repertory. There is also internal evidence to suggest that some important scores were intended for performance elsewhere than the Pietà. These include the present Beatus vir and Dixit Dominus, both of which allow the bass voice an independent role, unusually for Vivaldi`s sacred choral works. The identity of the tenor and bass singers in works composed for the Pietà has aroused speculation. One hynothesis has it that male members of the staff were drafted into the choir - improbable in the rigidly stratified world of the Pietà, where rubbing shoulders with one`s pupils would surely have been considered undignified. Another hypothesis proposes that choristers were borrowed from local churches. This is doubly unlikely: first, because they would have been needed by their own choirs on the same occasions in the Church year; second, because the Pietà`s account books mention no such arrangements. One must therefore conclude, if only provisionally, that the Pietà`s girls supplied these low voices themselves. A list of entrants to the coro (this Italian word denotes, in eighteenth-century usage, any large performing body, whether made up of voices, instruments, or both combined) dated 1707 includes one "bass" and three "tenors" in a context where confusion with instruments is impossible. Female tenors were not unheard of, even as operatic singers, but one must assume (barring freaks of nature) that the "basses" doubled the instrumental bass line an octave higher in the manner of violins or violas playing all'unisono with the cellos - incidentally, a device of which Vivaldi was exceptionally fond. If this assumption is correct, it follows that, where there is no instrumental bass to be doubled by the vocal bass, the work could not have been performed satisfactorily at the Pietà. The bulk of Vivaldi`s extant sacred vocal music is found among the manuscripts, largely autograph, of the Foà and Giordano collections acquired by the National Library., Turin, in the 1920`s. Interest in - and performance of - the vocal works (which include numerous operas and cantatas) has lagged considerably behind that of the instrumental works, so that up to now only a handful - the Magnificat, the Gloria (RV 589), and perhaps the Stabat Mater - have penetrated the general repertoire. The sacred compositions, excluding purely instrumental works, can be conveniently divided into works with liturgical and non-liturgical (i.e. freely-invented) texts. Into the hrst category come five Mass movements - and a complete Mass (RV 586) preserved in Warsaw - 15 Vespers psalms, nine hymns, and a Magnificat existing in several versions. The second comprises 12 motets and eight introduzioni (these are all works for solo voice performed in lieu of antiphons or introits), plus the oratorio “Juditha triumphans.” This summary excludes several works in the Turin volumes which were not composed by Vivaldi, although they seem to have once belonged to his personal collection. It is highly likely that the extant compositions include several designed to form part of the same Mass or Vespers cycle. Although Francesco Caffi, the nineteenth-century historian, wrote of a "Mass for voices and instruments which was repeatedly performed by those young girls on every great feast," no settings by Vivaldi of the Sanctus and Agnus Dei (discounting those in the Mass RV 586) have survived. It appears, however, from bibliographical evidence (paper type and layout of the score) that the less well known of the two Glorias (RV 588) belongs with the Credo, RV 591. The relationship of the psalms and hymns is if anything less clear. Piero Damilano has made a valiant attempt to identify two cycles of live psalms appropriate for Vespers on the two feasts named in the description of the duties of the maestro di coro, but the reality is obviously far more complex. What we possess is the fragmentary remains of more than two such cycles, whose original state of completeness is equally problematic. In short, we know very little about how the individual compositions were intended to fit together, and any surmises we make must be very tentative. The works can be divided in two further ways: first, into compositions for solo voice, for choir, and for choir with soloists (all with an orchestra of strings and continuo, and sometimes additional instruments); second, into "short" settings in a single movement and "long" settings in several contrasted movements. The forms employed are what one would expect for the composer and period. Non-liturgical movements for a soloist are generally shaped as recitatives or da capo arias on the operatic pattern (though the "alleluias" concluding the motets are through-composed, with strong hints of the concerto). Liturgical movements, the rare fugal example excepted, generally resemble the outer section of a da capo aria, with twn principal vocal sections framed and separated by ritornelli; a few accompanied recitatives and ariosi are also found. The choruses in “Juditha triumphans,” representative of the non-liturgical type, are brief and dance-like as in Vivaldi`s operas. Those in liturgical works may be through-composed (if short) or fugal; the more extended movements, however, draw on the basic plan of the concerto, with its alternation between ritornello sections, whose material is restated in various keys, and episodes. Where both choir and soloists participate in the same movement, as in “Lauda Jerusalem," the pattern is more complex: the orchestra alone has a ritornello function, and the soloists (with light orchestral accompaniment) an episodic function; but the choir may appear in either role. Writing for two choirs separated spatially to produce an antiphonal effect originated during the sixteenth century in St. Mark`s, Venice - a natural outcome of the basilica’s possession of two principal organs housed in lofts some distance apart. The polychoral style rapidly became a favourite means of deploying large forces on grand occasions, and was practised all over Europe, so that by the eighteenth century one can hardly regard it still as characteristically Venetian. The two (or more) cori are usually treated, concertato fashion, as opposing blocs in music of the sixteenth and seventeenth centuries, as represented by the Gabrielis and Schütz. Eighteenth-century composers, for whom the technique of concertato was obsolete, tended either to handle the ensembles in a facile responsorial manner, letting one coro take over from the other at appropriate points (thus the single-choir version, RV 610, of Vivaldi`s Magniticat could be converted to a double-choir work, RV 610a, by the addition of a few cues to the score), or to ignore the antiphonal element altogether and merely take advantage of the greater number of available parts, as in the final movement of the present Dixit Dominus. Some writers may have assumed too lightly that Vivaldi`s several compositions in due cori were written for St. Mark`s. At any rate, one of them, “Lauda Jerusalem," must have been performed at the Pietà, as the four solo sopranos - two in each coro - are named in the autograph score as Margarita, Giulietta, Fortunata, and Chiaretta. The same girls sang in "Il coro delle muse," a work performed at the Pietà on March 21, 1740 (together with instrumental music by Vivaldi) in honour of the visiting Prince of Saxony. In an anonymous poem ofthe late 1730`s on the subject of the Pietà`s female musicians, Fortunata is described as "young," Giulietta as "an adolescent," and Chiaretta as "a girl," so "Lauda Jerusalem" must date from around the same time. It should be noted that in 1723 smaller choir-stalls were added on either side of the main choir-stalls in the Pietà`s chapel, perhaps with such works in mind. The inclusion in this recording of the Introduzione al Dixit “Canta in prato,” for solo soprano, strings, and continuo, is justified by the possibility that it was intended to precede the present Dixit. The keys of the two works (G major and D major) are not identical, as they are in the case of the Gloria (RV 588) and its introduzione, but they are at least congruent. It is amusing to see the intrusion of Arcadian imagery -the nightingale (Philomela) as songster - into a sacred work. Listeners familiar with Vivaldi`s Concertos "La primavera" (Spring) and "Il cardellino" (The Goldfinch) will recognise the warbling of the violins in the opening aria. The opening chorus of the Dixit Dominus (RV 594) reminds one through its brilliant trumpet and oboe writing - indeed, through the very motives from which it is formed - of the better-known Gloria (RV 589). The second movements are also alike in tonality (B minor) and mood; unlike the "Et in terra pax," however, the “Donec ponam" makes use of quasi-fugal imitation. Of the remaining eight movements of the Dixit one may single out for mention the "Lombardic" rhythms on the violins in No. 4 ("Tecum principium"); the severe fugue with regular countersubjects on the words beginning "Tu es sacerdos” in No. 5 ("Jurabit Dominus"): the energetic and tightly-knit interplay of tenor and bass soloists, in illustration of the words “confregit in die irae suae reges” (He hath broken kings in the day of His wrath), in No. 6 ("Dominus a dextris tuis"); the rippling triplets depicting the brook in No. 8 ("De torrente"); the massiveness and floridity of the concluding fugue on “Sicut erat in principio.” The subject of the last movement, in long, even notes like a cantus firmus, could be mistaken for a fragment of plainsong; in fact, it reproduces the shape of a motive much used as a ground bass, especially in chaconnes, in Vivaldi`s day. The motive appears with this function in at least three concertos (RV 107, 114, and 583), one aria (from “L”incoronazione di Dario"), and one chorus (from "Giustino") by Vivaldi; it also underpins the first eight bars of J.S. Bach`s “Goldberg” Variations and is employed as a fugue subject in the last movement of the sonata in François Couperin`s sonata-suite "La françoise." Both “Kyrie eleison” movements of the powerful Kyrie RV 587 (the hrst much condensed and the second minus its introduction) were appropriated, in a paraphrase for strings, for Vivaldi`s "Concerto madrigalesco," RV 129 (which borrows another movement from the Magnilicat!). To complicate matters, the Magnilicat shares, as does in part the "Et incarnatus est" of the Credo RV 591, the boldly chromatic opening sequence of chords. Clearly, this was a passage of which Vivaldi was fond. The second "Kyrie eleison," in which the two cori remain in unison, is a particularly good example of a vocal fugue with non -obbligato instrumental doubling. An interesting feature of Vivaldi`s "long" setting (there is also a one-movement setting, RV 598) of the Beatus vir is the use as a refrain, repeated live times between movements, of a five-bar strain sung twice (successively to the first and second lines of text) extracted from the opening movement. The nine movements are particularly well contrasted: “Potens in terra" (No. 2) creates unusual sonorities through being a "double" unison setting; “Exortum est in tenebris" achieves a fine climax by combining towards its end the two principal ("exortum" and "misericors") motives; "Jucundus homo" offers a rare example in Vivaldi`s music of a solo organ part; "In memoria aeterna," a tender terzetto, reveals his flair (little suspected by those brought up on old histories of music) for imitative and fugal writing; "Peccator videbit" is an imaginative and ingenious threefold alternation of a Largo and a Presto section. The "Gloria Patri" opens with a varied restatement of material from the opening movement, as does the corresponding section of the Dixit (and of the Magnificat). Vivaldi`s intention is to lend a punning significance to the following words: “Sicut erat in principio” (Thus it was in the beginning). Here he is a little subtler than Bach, who in his Magnificat does not begin the reference back until he arrives at the very words “sicut erat.” At the climax of Vivaldi`s concluding fugue each voice in turn (the cori are in unison) intones the doxology on a monotone in pseudo-plainsong fashion. "Lauda Jerusalem" is a "short" setting, conceived as a single concerto-like movement. The soprano solos in each choir are marked in the score to be sung by two female soloists (see above) in unison, but in modern performance they can be taken most satisfactorily by a single voice. The two solo parts respond to one another, but are never heard simultaneously. This concept of a duet as a dialogue rather than an ensemble is often encountered in late Baroque Italian music (Pergolesi`s "Stabat Mater," for example), and is one of several features betraying the late date of this work. Though its text is extracted from Psalm 69, "Domine ad adiuvandum me" is in fact the response to the versicle "Deus in adiutorium intende" with which the celebrant opens Vespers. Vivaldi`s three-movement setting is as perfect a work of its kind as he ever produced. The brilliant opening movement captures the urgency expressed by the word "festina" (hasten). In the "Gloria Patri" the solo soprano gracefully threads her way through a closely-knit dialogue between the two orchestras, both without continuo. The final movement is an impressive introduction and fugue unified by its continuous quaver bass. Michael Talbot MOTETS A CANTO SOLO CON STROMENTI The word “motet” has been used for several quite different kinds of vocal composition during its 700 years of existence. Originally, a motet (the term is a diminutive of the French word “mot”) was a vocal composition based on a Gregorian cantus firmus, in which each of the two or more added parts had its own text, sometimes a vernacular or secular text. By the fifteenth century the classical definition of a motet was established: a polyphonic setting without cantus firmus of a scriptural text. During the Baroque period two somewhat different interpretations of the word arose in France and Italy. To the French of the grand siècle a motet could be almost any kind of sacred vocal composition. The Italians reserved the term for a setting of a non-liturgical text performed by a solo singer with an orchestral accompaniment. Quantz (1752) defines the genre in these words: “Nowadays, the Italians give the name ‘motet’ to a sacred solo cantata in Latin, which consists of two arias and two recitatives, finishing with a Halleluia, and which is commonly sung by one of the best singers during Mass, after the Credo.” The solo motet is just one example of the trend towards solismo in Italian music of the early eighteenth century. It is the sacred counterpart of the solo cantata with instrumental accompaniment, which it closely resembles in the layout of text and music; the solo motet and cantata are likewise the vocal counterparts of the solo concerto and sonata. Composers favoured a brilliant, florid style, as observed in Mozart’s “Exultate, jubilate” (K. 165), a late example of the genre. To describe such a piece as a “concerto for voice” would not be inapt - especially in a case such as Vivaldi’s, where the omission of an introductory recitative produces (discounting the Alleluia, a sort of coda) the same fast-slow-fast configuration found in the concerto proper. One place where the singing of motets was an established practise was the Ospedale della Pietà in Venice. Its maestro di coro was required, according to an ordinance of 1710, to compose at least two motets each month. It is not known who had the task of supplying the texts, which are written in a somewhat insecure Latin heavily influenced by vernacular poetry both in language and imagery. From 1703 to 1709 and again from 1711 to 1716 Vivaldi served the Pietà as a violin master. It is unlikely that he would have embarked on sacred vocal composition, had not the then maestro di coro, Francesco Gasparini, suddenly departed in 1713, leaving a vacancy which was not satisfactorily filled until 1719. Vivaldi stepped into the breach. The governors of the Pietà were well pleased with his efforts, voting him a special emolument in 1715 in respect of “a complete Mass, a Vespers, an oratorio, over 30 motets and other compositions.” Before long, Vivaldi won a continent-wide reputation for his sacred vocal music. Works like the present motets justify Mattheson’s opinion of Vivaldi as a composer with an exceptional understanding, for a non-singer, of effective vocal writing. Michael Talbot VIVALDI IN SAN MARCO I & II When the people of eleventh-century Venice found themselves with a large sum of money at their disposal, a chronicle of the time tells us, the choice fell between waging a war, or building a new cathedral. The Venetians decided to build the church, and so the present Cathedral of St. Mark’s was begun in 1063. It was the third church of St. Mark’s on the site. The first, begun in 829, was partially destroyed by fire during a citizens’ revolt the following century, and the reconstructed building lasted less than 90 years. The first steps to build a church of St. Mark’s had been taken to house the remains of the evangelist, smuggled out of Alexandria. The saint had been immediately adopted as Protector of Venice, a symbol of independence and liberty for Venice in opposition to the patron imposed by Ravenna. This explains why the cathedral gradually became the centre of the religious and political life of the city. The doges were elected there: emperors and popes met there, and the Venetians would gather there in the joyful moments of victory and in the sad hour of defeat. Music had always played an important part in the city’s religious and ceremonial political life, so it was natural that the focal point of Venice’s musical development should be St. Mark’s. From the “Cappella”, the body of singers and musicians attached to the church, there began in the sixteenth century the creative impulse that was to spread throughout the city and later carry the fame of Venetian musicians throughout Europe. To such composers as Adrian Willaert, Andrea and Giovanni Gabrieli, Claudio Monteverdi, and many others must go the credit for the extraordinary development and exceptionally high standards reached by music in Venice when Antonio Vivaldi was born there in 1678. His father was a well-known violinist in the “Cappella”, and Vivaldi, perhaps influenced by the Cathedral’s impressive services and music, eventually dedicated his life to religion as a priest, and to music. The sacred texts were certainly known to him, but it is clear from the way he clothed them with music that we are dealing with no mere superficial knowledge, but with a feeling for them that could only have come through a deep and sincere, though perhaps ingenuous, love for them. All the works on Discs 7 - 8 were recorded in St. Mark’s itself. The Gloria in D, RV 589, for soloists, chorus and orchestra opens with a short festive orchestral introduction which precedes and prepares for the joyful shout from the chorus, “Gloria, Gloria.” The serene and happy mood of the whole of this first section contrasts with the calm almost sorrowful nature of the second in which the chorus sings the prayer “Et in terra pax hominibus bonae voluntatis” with great depth of feeling. The third section “Laudamus te,” is a brilliant duet; the soprano and contralto soloists take it in turns and join together in singing the praises of God. The fourth section is linked without a break to the fifth since the next does not permit any interruption. In No. 4, Adagio, the chorus makes a crescendo on the words “Gratias agimus tibi" which flows over into the strongly enunciated “propter magnam gloriam tuam” of the fifth section, marked Allegro. The following section, No. 6, “Domine Deus Rex,” is for soprano soloist, oboe obbligato and continuo. This section consists of a beautiful melody in the rhythm of a Siciliana which passes from the instrument to the voice and after a dialogue between the two is brought to a conclusion by the oboe. The chorus returns in No. 7. After eight bars of introduction by the orchestra alone which set the rhythm (dotted crotchet) of the whole section, the contraltos sing a strongly rhythmical theme, which is at once repeated by the sopranos. After a more melodic central part, first the tenors, then the basses take up the theme first given out by the contraltos and lead the choral part of the section to a conclusion that is almost dramatic in character. The orchestra rounds off this section by repeating the first eight bars. No. 8 is a moving invocation made by the contralto soloist and chorus. It concludes with the expression of hope “miserere nobis.” This is one of the most moving parts of the Gloria. No. 9 for the chorus who, as in the preceding section, address the “Lamb of God who taketh away the sins of the world" and ask “suscipe deprecationem nostram” with an insistence and in a crescendo that make it seem as if they wished to turn the request into a demand. No. 10 is a most beautiful aria for contralto. The introduction and the close of this section, which is full of life and vitality, are given to the orchestra alone. With No. 11, “Quoniam Tu solus,” we return to the same mood and thematic material of the opening section, though here it is differently treated. The Gloria ends with No. 12, a fugue which is begun by the chorus and continuo with the orchestra soon joining in. Later in the section the orchestra is given some brief solo passages. In spite of the use of contrapuntal material this section is richly expressive and succeeds in communicating deep feelings of faith, certainty, and joy. While the Gloria is one of the better-known pieces of Vivaldi’s church music, it is difficult to understand why the Salve regina RV 616 has been so neglected, because, apart from the considerable problems set by its performance, it contains orchestral writing of great refinement and is conceived as a tender and affectionate homage to the Mother of Jesus. It is for contralto solo and two string orchestras. In the first and last section of the work, the first orchestra also includes two flutes and in the third an obbligato flute. The first section, Andante, has an orchestral introduction which is developed at some length. The contralto’s part alternates melodic and florid passages and is not free from what vein of melancholy which is often present in some of the slow movements in Vivaldi’s instrumental music. The second section is an Allegro in which the two orchestras answer one another and blend, both when playing alone and when accompanying the soloist, to produce wonderful effects of sonority. The second orchestra is silent in the Larghetto which forms the third section. This is begun by the obbligato flute, accompanied by the violins and violas of the first orchestra. The flute returns after the first phrase of the contralto and after carrying on a dialogue with the voice brings the section to a close. A clever expressive effect is obtained in this section by the crotchet pause which interrupts the word “suspiramus” after the first syllable and makes it particularly realistic. In No. 4, marked Allegro ma poco, a deeply moving melody is given out first by the two orchestras playing in unison, then by the voice. No. 5, Andante molto, is a continuous interweaving of the two orchestras. The solo part is very expressive. In the last section, Andante, the voice is given a very moving melodic line, but whereas the mood of the previous section is tender and affectionate, in this, as in the opening section, there returns that suggestion of melancholy, so typical of Vivaldi, which is not sufficiently strong to be called sadness but which is enough just to cloud the serenity of the music. Vivaldi composed two versions of the Magnificat in G minor (RV 610/611). The second differs from the first in that some of the sections were completely rewritten. For this recordingl have kept the “Sicut locutus est” section of the first version since I find it more interesting than that of the second, but otherwise, for the rest of the work, I have used the definitely superior second version. The short opening chorus is a magnificent example of the use of harmony as a means of expression. This is followed by three arias, the first two (sections 2 and 3 of the work) are for solo soprano and the last (section 4) for contralto solo. The music of these three sections keeps close to the text in a remarkable manner. Section 2, Allegro, with its florid style, its many trills and appoggiaturas, is an expression of exultancy. No. 3, Andante molto, which has an insistent triplet figure running throughout the movement, sometimes passing from the orchestra to the voice, conveys deeply felt emotion. The extremely elegant Andante which follows gives utterance to the Virgin’s joy and gratitude for the predilection shown her by God. The expressive ascending appoggiaturas (B natural to C) in the 34th bar in the first violins is a noteworthy feature of this section. The solo parts demonstrate the high level of vocal technique of the period. The orchestral writing is never limited to mere accompaniment for the voice but prepares the mood of the piece, intervenes and takes part in the dialogue, and brings it to a close. No. 5, Andante molto, is for the chorus. After four introductory bars from the orchestra in which a short theme is given out first by one section of the orchestra and imitated by the others in turn, the chorus takes up the same musical idea, treating it at times in the same imitative way and at others singing homorhythmically. In this section too the unusual harmony has an important expressive function. No. 6, Presto and No. 7, Allegro, are both choral numbers. The first is energetic and powerful, as the text requires; the second, in which the chorus and orchestra are in unison practically throughout the movement, is impetuous and forceful. No. 8, Allegro, the last solo aria of the Magnificat, though requiring virtuoso technique from the contralto soloist, is still deeply moving, No. 9 is a brief chorus divided into three parts: Largo - Allegro - Adagio. The first and the third are homorhythmic while in the Allegro the themes pass from one section of the choir to another in a imitative manner. No. 10, Allegro ma poco, uses two oboes and a bassoon, the only time this combination appears. The choir in this section, consists of sopranos, contraltos, and basses, without the tenors. This part of the work makes one realise the influence exerted by Italian composers on Handel. The finale is also a chorus and like No. 9 is divided into three parts. The first, Largo, and the second, Andante, are short whereas the third, Allegro, is a fugato movement developed at some length. A part of the thematic material heard at the beginning of the work returns in the Largo. The Andante is a short chorale in which the noble melody is given to the sopranos. In the Allegro the theme is strongly enunciated by the tenors beneath a counter-subject from the contraltos and it is later taken up by all the voices in a lively contrapuntal construction. The movement comes to rest in the long notes of the final cadence and brings the Magnificat to its grandiose conclusion. We do not know if the Te Deum, RV App. 38, is the one performed in Venice in September 1727 during the festivities organised by the French Ambassador there. The “Mercure de France” reported that “about eight o’clock there took place a very fine concert which lasted about two hours; the music and the Te Deum were by the famous composer Vivaldi.” Certainly this is the only Te Deum in the collection of Vivaldi manuscripts in the Biblioteca Nazionale in Turin, though this is incomplete and probably in the hand of a copyist. I have carefully revised and completed the manuscript keeping as faithfully as possible to the spirit of the work. The work opens vigorously with the basses alternating whith two trumpets playing over cellos, double-basses, and continuo. When the basses have stated that all heavenly beings praise God, the whole chorus intervenes to sing three times the word “Sanctus.” No. 2, "Tu Rex gloriae," is a beautiful aria for soprano solo and continuo with an oboe occasionally answering the voice; it is joined without a break to the next section, No. 3 “Judex crederis.” This is a short but powerful chorus accompanied by the whole orchestra, with the first trumpet dominating in some points to produce an effect of prodigious vitality. No. 4, “Te ergo,” is for the chorus accompanied by continuo alone. The interval of a minor second returns often in the long opening phrase of the sopranos. It is characteristic of the whole section and gives it a mood of sorrowing insistence which finds peace only at the finish, two bars before the attacca of No. 5, “Aeterna fac,” in which the key changes suddenly from D minor to D major. The basses in this section are divided into two and are accompanied by the lower strings and the organ. No. 6, “Et laudamus,” is a long section in which the soprano and contralto soloists, accompanied by the continuo, answer one another at every new phrase of the text, with brief interventions from the two oboes. No. 6 is linked to the last section. “In Te Domine,” without a break. In this section the chorus and orchestra, which also has two solo episodes, interweave and develop their themes in an austere fugato style until the climax of the “non confundar in aeternum” is reached. Though very different in character the Magnificat and the Te Deum are equally successful examples of Vivaldi’s church music and testify to its sincerity and depth of feeling. Vittorio Negri