Search - Ensemble Micrologus :: Landini e la Musica Fiorentina (Landini and his Florentine contemporaries - 14th Century) /Micrologus

Someone visiting Florence today can only imagine the exciting, flourishing city of the 14th century, but the music on this award-winning disc will help. Francesco Landini, the "blind man of the organ," was the most famous of the Florentine composers during this period. Although he was a chaplain and organist, only Landini's secular music survives. The same goes for the other composers represented on this very fine program of instrumental pieces and songs. The songs are mostly about love--what else?--and the performances are very characterful, such that we can almost guess the text's meaning without understanding the Italian. The instrumental playing is exciting and often virtuosic, and uses a quite large array of period instruments--harp, flutes, shawm, vielle, rebec, lute, portativ organ, and a variety of percussion. -- David Vernier