Since its inception in 2001, the Vivaldi Edition has explored the fantastic diversity of the work of the Prete Rosso. Presented by Giulio Prandi’s Coro e Orchestra Ghislieri, this seventy-second volume is dedicated to sacred music.

Two exceptional works, the Dixit Dominus, RV807, and the Magnificat, RV611, here frame rare motets such as Sanctorum meritis, RV620, and Vos invito, barbarae faces, RV811.

Preserved at the Saxon State Library, the Dixit Dominus belonged to a lot ordered from a Venetian publisher in the mid-1750s by the Saxon court which, threatened by the Prussian army, had been forced to flee Dresden for Warsaw.

Illustrating the highly pictorial text of Dixit Dominus, Vivaldi favours a lively and sparkling aesthetic, full of figurations. For example, pairs of repeated sixteenth notes depict the gentle lapping of a stream (‘De torrente in via bibet’) while the impressive final fugue embodies the majesty of Christian communion.

Also forged in an ingenious and hushed counterpoint, the second motet of this programme, Confitebor tibi, Domine, presents three solo voices, something rare for Vivaldi. Hymn from the liturgy of the martyrs, Sanctorum meritis, RV620, then introduces Vos invito, barbarae faces, whose text enjoins the believer to fight against the forces of evil.

This programme finally offers the final version of the Magnificat in G minor, RV611, in which the Red Priest specifically dedicated to a few singers of the Ospedale della Pietà certain sections, radically transformed since the first version of the 1710s. This results in little less ensemble parts, and more arias for the soloists, almost a foretaste of Classicism.

Faithful to his quest for clarity and joy that had been highlighted by moving recordings devoted to Jommelli and Rossini, Giulio Prandi, for this first collaboration with the naïve label, glorifies the luminous, aristocratic sobriety of Vivaldi. Unexpected and invigorating.