The Madrigals of Monteverdi VI

Grouped into nine books and published between 1587 and 1651, we continue this splendid journey through this corpus, understood as an exercise in proto-opera and a theater of emotions. With this third book, published in Venice in 1592 by Riccardo Amadino, it constitutes the first documentary confirmation of the composer's stay in Mantua, where he worked as a viola player at the court of Vincenzo Gonzaga.

In many ways, this new collection reflects the cultural atmosphere of the city and also the tastes of its patron and benefactor. The selection of literary texts includes authors from the court of Ferrara, such as Giovanni Battista Guarini and Torquato Tasso. This Terzo Libro marks a milestone in exploring the inner life of the word, which music captures and amplifies with a sensitivity and force that is both renewing and transformative.

On the other hand, the contrapuntal richness of some madrigals speaks to a certain culmination of the possibilities of the prima prattica. A book that showcases the composer's highest compositional skills, seeking to present works on a larger scale and a prodigious balance between tradition and innovation, so successful in his time that it required five reprints within two decades.

Rinaldo Alessandrini, conductor, harpsichordist, and a true authority on the composer, will be the guide through the paths of this fascinating and lush universe full of precious miniatures. The word, the music, the declamation, or the stile concitato will place us in front of the first attempts to represent human passions through text and harmony.

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