About the album

In the Italian society of the early eighteenth century, the successful musical genre of the chamber cantata played the role of noble entertainment. In its most widespread form, the cantata was a short composition, consisting of a couple of arias with the addition of one or two recitatives. An excellent voice and the instruments of the basso continuo could be enough for the performance. The chamber cantatas that the Venetian composer Benedetto Marcello thoroughly engaged in, especially in his early years from approximately 1710 to 1720, were an invalable laboratory for his famous Pslams.

The present recording offers six chamber cantatas by Marcello for the bass voice on the subject of love. All the cantatas of this recording are in RARA form (Recitative-Aria-RecitativeAria) and the arias regularly have the da capo form. The recitatives are often unpredictable in their harmonic solutions.

Benedetto Marcello’s lovers are not happy. They struggle with feelings of rejection, perceptions of deceit and betrayal, jealousy, hope, and mourning. Their thoughts and reflections raise questions. It gives me great joy to explore these complex feelings in the music, together with my appreciated colleagues. Above all, we have sought to be expressive and to honor the Doctrine of Affections.