Tunder / Tomadin,Manuel - Organ Works - COMPACT DISCS [CD]

Daniel Pio Dal Barba (1715-1801) was Maestro di Cappella at Verona Cathedral, a position he took up in 1762. Before this, he taught at the Accademia Filarmonica in Verona where, on 9 January 1770, he met Wolfgang Amadeus Mozart, who was visiting the city. He enjoyed already a successful career as a composer of operas for two theatres in Verona. There are also numerous references to his work at other theatres in the Veneto and Trentino regions, where he was both a composer and male soprano. Dal Barba's music was highly appreciated for it's spontaneous and popular character. He introduced a simple style into the church, far from learned academicism but above all aimed at the common people, pleasing, melodious and harmonious. This new recording presents Dal Barba's Requiem, a substantial and dramatic work in which the Dies Irae alone lasts 20 minutes. Also included are a Gloria and a Te Deum. These works are performed by the Coro Istituzionale Armonica, which was founded in 2018 by Alberto Turco in order to perform works by composers that have come to light in the archives of Verona Cathedral. Accompanying them, the ensemble Il Narvalo has already won critical praise for it's Brilliant Classics album of music by the Spanish composer, Juan Frances de Iribarren (95859)

Born around 1570, Christian Erbach apparently pursued the career of a musician from his earliest years. By his early 30s he had taken over organist positions in Augsburg previously held by the better known Hans Leo Hassler (the subject of another unrivalled compendium by Manuel Tomadin on Brilliant Classics, 95331). Like Hassler, Erbach was evidently influenced as a composer by Italian and in particular Venetian flavors of polychoral and effervescent writing even in his instrumental output. The predominant forms in this set are toccatas, canzonas and ricercars, as well as instrumental 'settings' of the Magnificat and the Ordinary of the Mass for liturgical use. Erlebach himself must have been an organist of tremendous flourish and with an ear for liturgical theatre, to judge from the colorful array of textures he demands in his music. Both his music and his renown as a teacher exercised a formative influence over the next two generations of German organ music - from which eventually emerged it's own dominant figure, Johann Sebastian Bach (who also looked over to the other side of the Alps for stylistic inspiration). In an extensive booklet introduction to Erlebach's life and works, the organist Manuel Tomadin makes available much research otherwise unavailable in English. He has chosen to make this comprehensive set on a selection of organs in northern Italy and Austria, all of them equipped with the registral possibilities to make the composer's music sing in it's own language, and several of them dating from Erlebach's own time, based in Bologna, Mantova, Pistoia and farther afield. All the instruments are illustrated in the booklet with color photographs and a detailed registration plan, making the set invaluable for both organ buffs and any listener with a broader interest in the German Baroque.

Giovanni Battista Martini (1706-1784) was born in Bologna, in that era part of the Papal States. His father, Antonio Maria Martini, a violinist, taught him the elements of music and the violin and he later learned singing and harpsichord playing and the art of counterpoint from Giacomo Antonio Perti. Having received his education in classics from the priests of the InchCongregation of the Oratory of Saint Philip NeriInch, he became a priest himself in 1722. In 1725, though only nineteen years old, he received the appointment of chapel-master at the Basilica of San Francesco in Bologna, where his compositions attracted attention. At the invitation of amateurs and professional friends he opened a school of composition at which several celebrated musicians were trained; as a teacher he consistently declared his preference for the traditions of the old Roman school of composition. Martini was a zealous collector of musical literature, and possessed an extensive musical library, estimated at 17,000 volumes. Among his many students was... Wolfgang Amadeus Mozart, who held him in high regard and always spoke fondly of him. InchPadreInch Martini, as he was called, wrote an immense oeuvre of more than 2500 works, many of them sacred vocal works. His keyboard works include more than 100 sonatas. This new recording presents the complete organ works of Martini, consisting mainly of Sonatas, but also shorter pieces like fugues, toccatas and preludes. In his earlier works Martini adopted the style of his illustrious predecessors, the masters of Baroque counterpoint, later he wrote in a less learned, more elegant and InchpleasantInch style, according to the demands of his audience. Played on a variety of historic Italian organs from the 18th century by Manuel Tomadin, one of the foremost Italian organists of today, a scholar and passionate musician, with an impressive discography to