Gramophone Magazine
May 2021
Editor's Choice

Anna Lucia Richter, Luca Pianca, Ensemble Claudiana

Monteverdi: L'Orfeo: 'Dal mio Parnasso amato'
Monteverdi: Zefiro torna
Monteverdi: La mia turca
Monteverdi: Lamento d'Arianna 'Lasciatemi morire', SV 107
Monteverdi: Pur ti miro (I gaze upon you) from L'Incoronazione di Poppea
Monteverdi: Et è pur dunque vero
Monteverdi: Confitebor tibi Domine, SV 296
Monteverdi: Lamento della Ninfa (Book 8), SV 163
Monteverdi: Si dolce e'l tormento, SV332
Monteverdi: Ohime ch'io cado

Anna Lucia Richter returns to Pentatone after her acclaimed Schubert album Heimweh with Il delirio della passione; a recording full of Monteverdi treasures, from heart-wrenching opera scenes (Lamento d Arianna,Pur ti miro from Poppea and the Prologue of L'orfeo) and religious music (Confitebor) to bucolic songs (Si dolce è il tormento). Richter works together with Ensemble Claudiana and Luca Pianca, one of the most eminent Monteverdi interpreters of our age. They offer a fresh perspective on Monteverdi's music by penetrating deeply into the original sources. Their interpretation of the famous Lamento d'Arianna, salvaged fragment of the lost score of the opera L'Arianna, is exemplary in that regard. Richter's passionate delivery is inspired by what precedes in the libretto, while Pianca has composed short, madrigalistic instrumental interludes between the solo sections, replacing the choral commentaries, of which only the original texts have survived. Altogether, the pieces on Il delirio della passione demonstrate Monteverdi's exceptional skill to express the most complex emotions, in music of timeless beauty. Anna Lucia Richter belongs to the most exciting young singers of her generation. Il delirio della passione is the second fruit of her exclusive collaboration with Pentatone, after Heimweh (2018), and her last soprano recording, as she will continue her career as a mezzo-soprano. Luca Pianca and Ensemble Claudiana both make their Pentatone debut.