Fabio Bonizzoni returns with a further Glossa release dedicated to the chamber vocal output of Georg Friedrich Handel: here, a second volume of duets (and trios), which features the vocal talents of Roberta Invernizzi, Silvia Frigato, Thomas Bauer and Krystian Adam. [read more...]

The diversity offered by the music of Georg Friedrich Handel has never been absent from the recorded catalogues. Yet it has only been in recent times that the full glorious depth of his chamber vocal works with Italian texts has been explored; and to do it justice it needs to be performed by artists who have both the interpretative and technical resources. These are expectations which are surely being matched when musicians of the quality of Fabio Bonizzoni and La Risonanza are involved, and no more so when singers in Roberta Invernizzi and Marina De Liso are deploying their vocal talents. The latest exploration into the Italian influences in the music of Handel comes with his chamber duets, on this new recording the ten works scored for soprano and alto voices, and written at various points in Handel’s journeying around Europe in the first half of the 18th century. The chamber duets are small-scale works but are never lacking in the animation or melodic inspiration which one associates with the best of Handel’s music. Having recorded these ten works Fabio Bonizzoni shows himself, as indicated in this new interview, to be interested in not stopping there. In total, Handel wrote over 20 chamber vocal works of this size and scope, so watch out for more to come! [read more...]

The collective artistic endeavours of Glossa have recently been recognized with an award of Label of the Year for 2014 by a Europe-wide panel of classical music media organizations – print and online magazines, as well as radio broadcasters – who form the International Classical Music Awards (ICMA) jury. This is to be presented at the Award Ceremony and Gala Concert in the Philharmonic Hall in Warsaw in April 2014. The Glossa adventure began back in 1992, led by two pioneering Spanish instrumentalists – brothers José Miguel Moreno and Emilio Moreno – who set about creating a treasure trove of recorded excellence, notably in the ever-developing field of “early music”. To this day, the label remains focused on its artists, supporting their musical journeys and inclinations, with the artistic direction entrusted to Carlos Céster. With a small team around him Céster operates from San Lorenzo de El Escorial, surrounded by the abundant natural riches of the mountains around Madrid and with an austere Monasterio in sight to ever encourage him in the rigour of his work. [read more...]

Fabio Bonizzoni’s instinct for honing in on the music of the great Baroque composers, such as Bach and Handel, and finding each time a fresh and inspirational response (proving once more, if needed, their greatness), now turns to two contrasting Italian masters in two separate recordings released on Glossa, which are devoted to the music of Antonio Vivaldi and Girolamo Frescobaldi. As the director of La Risonanza, Bonizzoni has demonstrated a rare understanding for the ever-evolving nature of Handel’s response to changing working stimuli. He also has an innate response to the depths of Italian musical expression as a keyboard player. So, there is no better musical direction for Bonizzoni’s journey to head off towards than the music of Girolamo Frescobaldi. By way of an introduction to both his new Frescobaldi and Vivaldi recordings Fabio Bonizzoni here touches upon certain key issues regarding his Italian musical forebears. [read more...]

Roberta Invernizzi is very clearly one of the finest sopranos to be heard today in the Baroque - and especially the Italian Baroque - repertory, as evidenced by the beauty that she brings not only to operatic roles and vocal roles which have been essayed by many other famous singers both on record and in performance, but also by her sense of clarity in and characterization of unknown music from the 17th and 18th centuries. The rediscovery of so much Italian music is a reflection of the labour and artistry of numerous musical minds but as a kind of prima donna inter pares the Milanese soprano stands out from many others for the intensity of her approach, to the point that she is emerging as a new muse for other distinguished modern-day practitioners of the Italian Baroque such as Fabio Bonizzoni and Antonio Florio who contribute here their own thoughts on the artistry of Roberta Invernizzi, adding to the soprano’s own considerations about her musical life.[read more...]

Having entranced audiences across Europe with their performances of the music which Georg Frideric Handel wrote during his time in Italy – mainly in Rome – between 1706-9, and having also delighted record buyers with the seven-volume series of “Le Cantate Italiane di Handel”, released on Glossa, Fabio Bonizzoni and his singers and musicians of La Risonanza have now gone on to impress the jury of the 2011 Gramophone Classical Music Awards. On October 6, at a ceremony held in The Dorchester hotel in London, the British magazine bestowed upon the Italian musicians a prestigious Gramophone Award in the Baroque Vocal category, for the final volume in the Handel series, Apollo e Dafne (a recording which contains two further cantatas, Agrippina condotta a morire and Cuopre talvolta il cielo as well as the title work). The singers on this disc were soprano Roberta Invernizzi and the two basses Thomas E. Bauer and Furio Zanasi. [read more...]