Collegium Vocale Gent

Arcadia is the land of eternal sunshine and unclouded joy – but death also afflicts those who dwell there. A musical memento mori: in an affecting programme of vocal music, Collegium Vocale Gent conducted by Philippe Herreweghe explores the sound worlds of the late Renaissance and early Baroque.

“Et in arcadia ego”: I too was in Arcadia – this well-known phrase was first encountered in the visual arts in a work by the Baroque painter Guercino, written on a stone plinth supporting a human skull that two shepherds stare at in contemplative horror. A memento mori that offers the viewer striking visual evidence that even in Arcadia, death will have the last word. Now “Et in arcadia ego” is the title for Philippe Herreweghe and his brillant Collegium Vocale Gent’s varied vocal programme focusing on Italian madrigals, motets and canzonette from the end of the 16th and beginning of the 17th centuries. It includes works by the Renaissance master Luca Marenzio, worshipped by his contemporaries as “Italy’s sweetest swan” for his sublime madrigal compositions that skilfully transpose the set texts into sonic form. And of course, there is also music by Marenzino’s contemporary Claudio Monteverdi, who was primarily responsible for the madrigal’s heyday as a passionate lament for the joys and sorrows of love, life and death at the end of the 16th century. A particular highlight will be the works of Salomone Rossi, who sought to create similar music for the synagogue to that which the Venetian maestro di cappella Monteverdi performed in St. Mark’s Cathedral. In 1622 he published the collection “Hashirim asher lish’lomo” (The Songs of Salomon) containing Hebrew psalms, hymns and prayers in the ornate Italian polyphony of the period: at the time a pioneering historical achievement, now a genuine musical rediscovery!