BENDA: Chamber Music [CD de audio] Ensemble Arcomelo, Benda and Michele Benuzzi

Georg Benda was born into a family with a strong musical vocation, whose father was the famous composer Jan Jiri Benda and his mother came from the famous Brixi family. In 1742 the twenty-year-old Georg moved to Berlin, where he obtained a job at the court of Frederick the Great. In a short time, Benda managed to establish himself as one of the most respected musicians and composers of the time, standing out especially in the fields of opera and melody. Among his most interesting works, Ariadne auf Naxos deserves mention, whose brilliant and innovative style paved the way for Mozart's later masterpieces. Benda published a collection of works conceived for domestic performances that were to feature “professional and amateur musicians” as protagonists, including a large number of keyboard pieces, chamber ensembles, and vocal cantatas. These are truly enchanting pages characterized by a wonderful freshness, an inexhaustible melodic invention and some dramatic touches, which marked the transition from the baroque to the classical era, which would reach its peak a few years later with Haydn and Mozart. These works are presented to us in the charming interpretation of the harpsichordist Michele Benuzzi (who can boast of an impressive album dedicated to Hans Leo Hassler, received with unanimous enthusiasm by the specialized press around the world) and the Ensemble Arcomelo, one of the ensembles of most valuable original Italian instruments of recent years. Elena Bertuzzi soprano; Paolo Borgonovo tenor; Ulrike Sl owik, violin; Arcomelo Ensemble