Istanpitta - Festive Music for the 14th Century Visconti Court - Alla Francesca (2002) [Philidor; FLAC]

This Istanpitta volume opens the window on a period of music when for very long (and no very good reason) it was assumed instrumental music simply didn't exist. The same critics who believed that, of course, also believed that all Western music originated in the Chapel, or at best, at Court; some of them still do. But the monophonic music collected in two puzzling manuscripts from the French 13th and Italian 14th centuries (this disc concentrates on the latter) inhabit a world of energetic themes, subtle complexity, and oral tradition. The transcribers aren't known, just that many hands over many years played a part. Fortunately, where other manuscripts have long since vanished, these two, and this one in particular, has survived to pose scholarly questions, and provide a lot of fine listening. Alla Francesca, as always, is stylish, theatrical, and technically finished.


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Bio enclosed. You can find all my classical uploads by searching on Philidor, or just looking in this regularly updated thread:

https://kat.cr/community/show/philidor-s-classical-stuff/