Donizetti Songs Vol.1 Lawrence Brownlee – ‘Il sorriso e il primo vezzo’

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The prolific and versatile Italian composer Gaetano Donizetti, one of the central figures of Italian bel canto opera, also wrote around 200 songs. Most of them are rarely performed and some, until recently, completely unknown. Curated by musicologist Roger Parker and under the leadership of Opera Rara’s artistic director Carlo Rizzi, Opera Rara presents the complete solo songs in a series of eight recital albums.

The project makes a powerful case for Donizetti as a key figure in 19th-century song repertoire, and for the importance of the Italian school in a field long dominated by German and French composers.

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Description

One of Opera Rara’s most ambitious projects in its fifty-year history is to record the complete solo songs of Gaetano Donizetti.

A handful of these songs has been long known and often heard in recitals; many more are listed in specialist catalogues but very rarely if ever performed; others still have been thought lost or are completely unknown. Recent research connected with this project, undertaken by Roger Parker in collaboration with Ian Schofield, has made clear that, in total, Donizetti wrote some 200 solo songs over the course of his thirty-year career. Making modern editions of this vast corpus has been an arduous task: sources for the songs are dispersed in European libraries and beyond, the composer’s autograph scores often having been casually given away at the time of composition (typically as a present from the composer to the dedicatee). But in their totality these compositions make a powerful case for Donizetti as a key figure in nineteenth-century domestic music-making: someone whose achievements in this area deserve to be better known; a body of work that, single-handedly, makes a powerful argument for the importance of the Italian “school” in a field long dominated by German and French composers.

Cast

Lawrence Brownlee, tenor
Carlo Rizzi, piano

Tracklist

[1] Bolero, L’amante spagnuolo ‘Corri destrier, deh celere’ (1’52)

[2] ‘Con le grazie, con le muse’ (1’51)

[3] Il donativo ‘Tu porgesti a me l’anello’ (1’41)

[4] ‘Non v’e più barbaro’ (2’38)

[5] ‘Perché mai Nigella amata’ (2’00)

[6] Canzonetta ‘Rendimi il core o barbara’ (2’17)

[7] Il sogno ‘Nostre misere menti’ (2’36)

[8] Canzone napolitana Amor marinaro ‘Me voglio fa ’na casa’ (2’06)

[9] Romanza ‘Malvina la bella sull’arpa’ (1’33)

[10] Lamento di Cecco da Varlungo ‘Com’e possivol mai Sandra crudele’ (1’52)

[11] ‘Trova un sol mia bella Clori’ (3’28)

[12] ‘Trova un sol mia bella Clori’ (2’45)

[13] Cavatina ‘Ella riposa… alcuni istanti almeno’ (5’36)

[14] Barcaruola ‘Sovra il remo sta curvato’ (1’52)

[15] Canzonetta ‘Or che la notte invita’ (with Jernej Albreht, clarinet) (3’36)

[16] Canzonetta ‘Se lontan, ben mio, tu sei’ (1’03)

[17] ‘O anime affannate’ (3’30)

[18] Canzonetta ‘Quando verra sul colle’ (2’28)

[19] Romanza, Quando verra quel di ‘Quando verra sul colle’ (3’55)

[20] L’ora del ritrovo ‘Odi, Elisa: questa e l’ora’ (3’11)

[21] Il sospiro ‘Donna infelice, stanca d’amore’ (3’44)

[22] Il ritorno del trovatore da Gerusalemme ‘Alfin di Gerosolima’ (4’17)

[23] ‘Lunge ne vai da Italia’ (1’39)

[24] Canzonetta, Bedda Eurilla ‘Bedda Eurilla gia la scena’ (1’47)

[25] Il nome indovinato ‘Voi vorreste il nome amato’ (1’49)

[26] ‘V’era un di che il cor beato’ (2’56)

[27] ‘Il sorriso e il primo vezzo’ (1’47)

[28] ‘Non giova il sospirar’ (1’03)