Alessandro Scarlatti and Vivaldi: favourites, rediscoveries and reconstructions

Abstract

Thirty-five years ago, Donald Grout opened his book on Alessandro Scarlatti’s operas with the lines ‘For every hundred people who know about, or who at least have heard, the music of Domenico Scarlatti I suppose there are perhaps three or four who know about or have heard much of the music of Domenico’s father, Alessandro’. Scores and recordings of the elder Scarlatti’s music have certainly multiplied in the intervening years, yet a scandalously large proportion of his prolific output remains little known and unrecorded. The recordings reviewed here are a mixture of whole works by Scarlatti and compilations featuring his compositions, including some pieces recorded for the first time, together with three new recordings of Vivaldi operas, two of which are also premiere recordings. Most likely to be familiar is Handel, Scarlatti: Dixit Dominus (Avie av2274, rec 2012, 62′), in which the settings of the psalm by both composers appear side by side for the first time, on a recording by the Choir of the Queen’s College, Oxford with The Brook Street Band directed by Owen Rees. Italian concerted liturgical music of this period was generally composed for small ensembles of professional singers rather than larger choirs, and while the 30-strong choir of the Queen’s College sings with admirable energy, rhythmic precision occasionally suffers in faster passages. Prominent among a strong group of soloists is bass Matthew Brook, who gives fine renditions of ‘Dominus a dextris tuis’ in both composers’ settings.