An enthralling confrontation
Rinaldo Alessandrini (conductor) Raffaele Giordani, Monica Piccinini, Matteo Bellotto; Concerto Italiano Naïve OP3058
Trust 2017’s celebrations of the 450th anniversary of Monteverdi’s birth to complicate things. Up until then, Concerto Italiano, Rinaldo Alessandrini’s crack cohort of native musicians, had made just one recording of Il Combattimento. Now there are two: the newcomer embedded in a programme devoted to night, love, and war; its predecessor in a set exploring the Eighth Book of Madrigals. And to choose between them is no easy matter. While Alessandrini’s first thoughts have an edgy freshness, nearly two decades on the gain in depth is inescapable, even if some of the edginess is less pronounced.
Any recording stands or falls by its narrator. And if Clorinda didn’t have the good fortune to repent and die – thus attracting a more-than-passing interest – the title roles prove less important than both the continuo and the small band of strings charged with bringing Monteverdi’s ‘experiments’ to life. His is a theatre of the mind, its pictures and dramas created in sound. And given the lean resources, there’s almost nowhere to hide – which is perhaps why Monteverdi was so explicit in his instructions as to how the piece should be performed.
Those instructions give any would-be interpreter an invaluable starting point, but so steeped is Alessandrini in the
Italian 17th century that he scarcely needs them. He breathes the Monteverdian air unmediated. In Raffaele Giordani’s narrator he has the ideal ally: there’s a vocal vibrancy that can spit out ‘l’ira accendi’ (whip up their fury) with a terrifying snarl yet caress the moment when recitative breaks into song, disclosing an almost enchanted surrender to night’s embrace – the sinfonia preceding it gorgeously exudes a spacious enveloping velvety mystery. Dramatic moments can look after themselves, but Alessandrini’s achievement in this later recording is
Alessandrini’s achievement is to treat every note, every silence, with the same care
to treat every note, every silence, with the same care. And how perfectly he modulates the dramatic intensity between the second round of fighting and the fatal blow – Giordani’s howls of ‘Ahi vista! Ahi conoscenza!’ (Unhappy sight! Unhappy recognition!) are blood-curdling.
Throughout, the instrumentalists are caught up in the thick of things, enriching the tragedy every bit as much as Monica Piccinini’s ill-fated Clorinda and Matteo Bellotto’s Tancredi. The story-telling grips; the emotional traumas dig deep; and everywhere, Alessandrini’s direction enthrals and illuminates.