Florent Marie – Giovanni Antonio Terzi: Lute Music (2022) [FLAC 24bit, 192 kHz]

Florent Marie – Giovanni Antonio Terzi: Lute Music (2022) [FLAC 24bit, 192 kHz]

French lutenist Florent Marie presents a collection of solo lute works by Giovanni Antonio Terzi (fl. 1580-1600). Terzi was a composer addressing modernity, as well as being a true European. The purpose of this recording is to try and supplement previous ones by emphasizing Terzi’s solo pieces, whose variety and quality have hardly been explored up to now. Music has always played an important part in Florent’s family: Singing polyphonic music and having a lute-making father—who built most of his instruments—prob-ably explains why he chose to devote himself to the lute family. At the Conservatoire National Supérieur de Musique et de Danse in Lyon he obtained his lute qualifications in Eugène Ferré’s class (2006) and discovered with Jean-Yves Haymoz the techniques of polyphonic improvisation, thus becoming one of the first lutenists to improvise ricercari in public.

Catalina Vicens – Il cembalo di Partenope (2017) [FLAC 24 bit, 96 kHz]

Catalina Vicens – Il cembalo di Partenope (2017) [FLAC 24 bit, 96 kHz]

Catalina Vicens: Italian music for harpsichord on the world’s oldest playable instrument (Naples 1525).

This new album of harpsichordist Catalina Vicens is a unique, multifaceted musical and poetic project. First, it features the world’s oldest playable harpsichord, a priceless treasure that dwells today in the National Music Museum of Vermillion, SD. She plays music from Naples, Italy from around 1525, the year when the instrument that she plays was actually built in Naples. Secondly, Ms Vicens conceived an imaginary tale of the life and story of that very instrument, partly based on historical facts, partly on poetic inspiration emerging from her encounter with this priceless treasure of a historical harpsichord. The CD comes with a free audiobook download of that same story, narrated by Ms Vicens herself and accompanied with original music from the CD.

Toyohiko Satoh – Bach & Weiss: Lute music (2015) [FLAC 24bit, 96 kHz]

Toyohiko Satoh – Bach & Weiss: Lute music (2015) [FLAC 24bit, 96 kHz]

The new solo CD of Toyohiko Satoh, the 72 year old Japanese lutenist who is considered my many as one of the most influential lute players of the last century, presents a well-known repertoire of baroque lute music. Mr. Satoh was the first lutenist to record Bach’s lute music on LP in the 70s (Phillips). Now he returns to this music 40 years later, delivering a completely different rendering of these iconic pieces. His playing has been influenced much by his studies of traditional Japanese arts such as tea ceremony, No-theater and Zen meditation. So here we are presented a recording that draws from the deep silence within, from the awareness of everything in the universe being connected, and from the understanding of Bach’s music as a universal, almost superhuman symbol of completeness.

Alexander Gergelyfi – Sapperlot! (2022) [FLAC 24 bit, 192 kHz]

Alexander Gergelyfi – Sapperlot! (2022) [FLAC 24 bit, 192 kHz]

On his first solo clavichord album, Alexander Gergelyfi creates an exceptionally colourful and at the same time sensual portrait of his home country Austria. Exquisite music from the 17th and 18th centuries is presented on what is probably the oldest surviving Austrian clavichord. The elegant “Admont” clavichord serves Alexander Gergelyfi as a gateway to hidden sounds and as a companion between dances. Simple yet affecting, keen, and fine.