Reviewed by Steven Whitehead

In his tragically short life Giovanni Battista Pergolesi (1710-1736) made a lasting impression on European music. His work 'La serva padrona' ('The maid turned mistress') was a theatrical success and arguably helped to raise the profile of comic opera as an art form in its own right. After his death from tuberculosis it was freely plagiarised and many aspiring composers found it lucrative to unearth a previously unknown work by Pergolesi and sell it on - making the work of later musicologists much more difficult than it might have been, a point discussed by Thilo Braun in his interesting and helpful booklet notes. Towards the end of his life Pergolesi wrote a setting for the "Stabat Mater" that was another great success and also borrowed by other, less talented composers. Such an influential work is inevitably going to attract different arrangements and performance approaches and, more recently, a variety of recordings, some of which have been reviewed elsewhere on this website. Broadly speaking, the two approaches to performance are either to try for authenticity with period instruments and, more difficult, a castrato singer - a role usually taken either by a boy treble, a counter-tenor, or a soprano. Given Pergolesi's other claim to fame in the world of opera, the use of a soprano seems to have most merit and on this recording we hear Giulia Semenzato along with mezzo-soprano Lucile Richardot whose voices both separately and in harmony sound very good indeed. Perhaps more opera than church choir but, to my ears at least, this is a more than acceptable compromise. Riccardo Minasi and his Ensemble Resonanz are not period musicians but, again, this will not matter to the general listener. The other matter to be decided in a recording of Pergolesi's 'Stab Mat' is what to include with it as, on its own, it does not give us our money's worth. On the disc under review we get a brief sonata by Angelo Ragazzi, a contemporary of Pergolesi. This is pleasant enough as an instrumental interlude but did not linger long in my memory. Then we reach part two of the recital with a setting of "Salve Regina" by the Catalan composer Joan Rossell which may be another Pergolesi that was, ahem, borrowed by someone else or, to be charitable, was written by one who admired Pergolesi. With the same singers as the Stabat Mater the two do sound sufficiently similar to have been written by the same man. Specialists will be able to spend many a happy hour comparing and contrasting and the rest of us can sit back and listen to some beautiful music being sung by two talented soloists and supported very well indeed by the other musicians. If you have never heard Pergolesi this is not a bad place to start but this version is not essential for any who already have his Stabat Mater.

The opinions expressed in this article are not necessarily those held by Cross Rhythms. Any expressed views were accurate at the time of publishing but may or may not reflect the views of the individuals concerned at a later date.

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