Search - Luca Dordolo, Daniela del Monaco, Silvia Piccollo :: Monteverdi: Amor, Dicea - Complete Duets 2

As director Alan Curtis points out in the booklet notes for this recording, Monteverdi wrote too many secular duets to fit on one compact disc, and too few to fill up two. So, the title notwithstanding, the follow-up to Curtis's magnificent first volume of Monteverdi's "complete duets" includes several trios and a number of madrigals for five or more voices (including the masterful setting of Petrarch's "Or che'l ciel e la terra"). The comedy here is gentler and less broad than on the previous disc, but Il Complesso Barocco's theatrical flair, expressive intensity, and feeling for the poetry that Monteverdi set to music are even more apparent this time around. Curtis and his ensemble have nearly outdone the extraordinary Monteverdi madrigal recordings that Rinaldo Alessandrini and Concerto Italiano made during the 1990s. The two ensembles--drawn from the same pool of talented Italian early-music singers--might differ in countless fascinating details of interpretation, but you shouldn't miss either one. --Matthew Westphal