Carlo Gesualdo: 5-Part Madrigals

Personnel: Les Arts Florissants, directed by William Christie.
"Art and life, sensibility and violence, instinct and premeditation are inextricably intertwined in the personality of Carlo Gesualdo, Prince of Venosa (1561-1613), who has come down in history as the very personification of the late Renaissance artist. Just as the arbitrary impulsiveness of action exercised in the name of aristocratic authority justified the brutal murder of his adulterous wife (the comely Maria d'Avalos whose misfortune was sung by many poets of the time), so, from the lofty position of his noble state (endowed moreover, with a vehement and visionary temperament), he could violate the rules that governed the marvellous equilibrium between poetry and music in the Italian madrigal. We see … an abundance of chromaticisms that emerge at the slightest suggestion … and … overflow in a continuous stream, modifying the melodic character and the harmonic balance" (from the booklet notes by Carlo Piccardi).
View catalog record here!