Roman born mezzo-soprano Cecilia Bartoli, specializes in bringing notice to the neglected composers and forgotten repertoires. I discovered her thanks to my recommendation list at Amazon.
Sacrificium is Bertoli’s most recent album, in collaboration with the Orchestra Il Giardino Armonico, conducted by Giovanni Antonini. It is a compellation of arias written for Castrati drawn from the works of Nicola Porpora (1686-1768), Antonio Caldara (c. 1670-1736), Francesco Araia (1709-1770), Carl Heinrich Graun (c. 1703-1759), Leonardo Leo (1694-1744), Leonardo Vinci (1696-1730), Riccardo Brosc hi (c. 1658-1756) and Geminiano Giacomello (c. 1692- 1740).
The singing is haunting, and often sad but also light and energetic. To my ear it is acrobatically sung with lots of feeling!
"The age of the castratos was one of the most dazzling and remarkable in European music history. Seldom has there ever been such a complete fusion of sensuousness and splendor, form and content, poetry and music, and, above all, such a perfection of vocal virtuosity, as was achieved in the glory days of the Baroque era. The legendary art of the castratos continues to exert its fascination even today, and despite the great human sacrifice it exacted, a new assessment of this extraordinary period is surely justified."
- Cecilia Bartoli
Cecilia Bartoli has been endowed with the Italian Knighthood and is an "Accademico effettivo" of Santa Cecilia, Rome, a French "Chevalier des Arts et des Lettres" and an "Honorary Member" of the Royal Academy of Music, London.
There is an interesting short video on Amazon of Bartoli talking about the album. It is worth watching. I hope to be able to see her in person some time and will definitely give her other records a listen soon!
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