I Fagiolini By Monteverdi - The Other Vespers

Singers, cornetts and sackbuts, early baroque violins, theorbos and organ bring to life this ravishing music to mark the 450th anniversary of Monteverdi’s birth and I Fagiolini’s own 30th anniversary year.

In 1640, at the end of his life, Monteverdi published a collection of church music that hadn’t been contained in the ‘1610 Vespers’ collection so often performed these days. Packed with sonorous and virtuosic music, yet hardly known to modern audiences, I Fagiolini offers an alternative Vespers taken from this second collection, featuring the composer’s fabulous psalm settings alongside a grand 3-choir Magnificat by Giovanni Gabrieli. The repertoire also features delightful surprises, like Monteverdi’s music for cornetto and four voices, strongly reminiscent of the Hilliards’ collaboration with saxophonist Jan Garbarek.