 “A new recording effort for the Arparla Duo with Davide Monti on the Baroque violin and Maria Christina Cleary on the double harp, a group that focuses on the Baroque repertoire and that of the transition between Classicism and Romanticism (17th and 19th centuries). The result of intense and accurate archival and documentary research, the album Another Kind of Rossi invites you on a journey into the intense creative climate of the Baroque and in particular of the reign of Pope Urban VIII, with his court composed of a vast following of artists and musicians. The album's program sees the two performers engaged in exploring the depth of the Toccate per tasto by Michelangelo Rossi (1601/2-1656), composer, violinist and organist. Maria Christina Cleary states: “Let's assume that Michelangelo Rossi's Toccate per tasto were played by harpists in Rome 400 years ago. Of all the 17thcentury Italian keyboard repertoire I have performed over the past thirty years, I find Rossi’s Toccate to be by far the most organic and intuitive music to play on the double harp, the three-stringed chromatic harp of the 17th century. (...) By “organic” music for the harp I mean the sense that the music was written for the harp, that it is enjoyable to play, and that it requires no arrangement whatsoever. (...) Rossi’s Toccate are rich in imitative passages, voices that dialogue through contrapuntal motifs, occasional short undeveloped sections, and surprising mode changes that employ seemingly unrelated harmonies.” To the pieces by Michelangelo Rossi, which are part of the research path started by the Duo several years ago and complete the previous CD (Uccellini OP. 4, Rossi Toccate e Correnti, STR 37166, 2020), the two musicians combine three Sonatas for violin and basso continuo from the 17th century selected from their favourite repertoire, works which, despite their beauty and poetry, are still relatively unknown: the Sonata Prima A 2. Canto and the Sonata Seconda A 2. Canto by Tarquinio Merula (1595-1665), an organist and violinist like Michelangelo Rossi, pieces which are part of a collection of sacred motets for two-five voices and basso continuo (organ), and finally the Sonata “La Pezzola” by the Bolognese composer Maurizio Cazzati (1616-1678).
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