Best Madrigal

Claudio Monteverdi’s Lasciatemi morire, originally part of his unfinished opera *L'Arianna*, is a profoundly moving five-voice madrigal from his Sixth Book (1614). This work showcases Monteverdi’s innovative use of expressive dissonance and harmonic color to evoke intense sorrow. It remains one of t...

Claudio Monteverdi’s “Hor ch’el ciel e la terra” is a complex six-voice madrigal from his Eighth Book (1638). The work sets Petrarch’s sonnet and demonstrates Monteverdi's innovative use of dynamics, creating dramatic shifts between powerful and delicate passages. It’s particularly significant for i...

Carlo Gesualdo’s “Moro, lasso, al mio duolo” is a Renaissance madrigal written in Italian for five voices. The work gained recognition through its intensely expressive harmonic language, particularly its dramatic use of chromaticism. Gesualdo masterfully employs these techniques to portray profound...

Luca Marenzio’s “Solo e pensoso” is an Italian madrigal composed around 1599. It adapts Petrarch's Sonnet 35, exploring themes of isolation and reflection through complex vocal textures. The piece features a distinctive soprano line—a sustained chromatic scale—which vividly portrays the image of a l...

Jacques Arcadelt’s “Il bianco e dolce cigno” is a Renaissance Italian madrigal composed around 1537. This four-voice piece, part of his first book published in Venice, remains remarkably popular and frequently performed. Its simple yet beautiful melody showcases the emerging style of the early madri...

Orlando Gibbons’ Silver Swan is a celebrated Renaissance madrigal composed for five voices. The piece explores themes of death and loss through the evocative imagery of a dying swan, reflecting the prevailing elegiac style of English music during the early 17th century. It’s particularly appreciated...

Claudio Monteveri’s “Cruda Amarilli” is a Renaissance Italian madrigal from his Fifth Book (1605). It sets Guido Rangel's pastoral poem, exploring themes of love and loss through complex five-part harmonies. The work gained recognition for its innovative use of dissonance, mirroring concerns raised...

Claudio Monteverdi’s “Si ch’io vorrei morire” is a complex five-voice madrigal from his Fourth Book published in 1603. The piece explores themes of intense desire and longing through innovative harmonic language, employing daring dissonances that were considered radical for the Renaissance period. I...

Claudio Monteverdi’s “Ecco mormorar l’onde” is a Renaissance madrigal composed for five voices. The work masterfully translates Torquato Tasso's poetry into musical terms, specifically depicting the sounds of waves and the emergence of daylight. This piece is notable for its sophisticated harmonic l...

"Now Is the Month of Maying" is a five-part English ballett by Thomas Morley, published in his First Book of Balletts to Five Voyces in 1595. Its text celebrates springtime dancing and courtship, while its repeated "fa la la" refrain reflects the light, dance-derived character of the ballett form. W...

"Tirsi morir volea" is a five-voice Italian madrigal by Luca Marenzio, setting a pastoral text about the lovers Tirsi and Clori. The word "morire," literally meaning "to die," carries the erotic double meaning commonly found in late Renaissance poetry, and Marenzio uses close musical imitation and t...

Monteverdi's Eighth Book of Madrigals, 'Madrigali guerrieri et amorosi' (1638), introduced the stile concitato (agitated style) and contains the dramatic narrative 'Combattimento di Tancredi e Clorinda.'

Claudio Monteverdi was a pivotal Italian composer of the late 16th and early 17th centuries. He is notable for pioneering opera with works like L'Orfeo, considered one of the earliest surviving operas and a foundational piece of the Baroque era. His compositions, including madrigals and sacred music...

Thule, the Period of Cosmography is a six-part English madrigal by Thomas Weelkes, published in his collection Madrigals of Five and Six Parts in 1600. Its text invokes distant Thule, icy seas, and Mount Etna, contrasting extreme cold with volcanic fire. Weelkes uses abrupt harmonic shifts, chromati...

A virtuosic duet for two tenors from Monteverdi's Eighth Book (1638) setting Guarini, celebrated for its elaborate parallel vocal ornamentation.

A un giro sol de' begl'occhi lucenti is a five-voice madrigal by Claudio Monteverdi, published in his Fourth Book of Madrigals in 1603. It sets an Italian text by Giovanni Battista Guarini and uses shifting textures, chromatic movement, dissonance, and close interaction between words and music to po...

Altri canti d'Amor is a madrigal by Claudio Monteverdi published in his Eighth Book of Madrigals in 1638. It opens the section titled Madrigali guerrieri and sets a text associated with the poetry of Giambattista Marino, turning from conventional songs of love toward the imagery of Mars, warfare, an...

Forsennata gridava is a late Renaissance Italian madrigal by the Flemish-born composer Giaches de Wert. Published in his Eighth Book of Madrigals in 1586, it sets a passage from Ludovico Ariosto's Orlando Furioso concerning the anguished Bradamante. Wert uses forceful declamation, rapid contrasts, r...

"Ah, dolente partita" is a five-voice Italian madrigal by Claudio Monteverdi, published in his Fourth Book of Madrigals in 1603. Its text comes from Giovanni Battista Guarini's pastoral tragicomedy Il pastor fido and presents a lament over a painful separation. Monteverdi uses expressive dissonance,...

L'Amfiparnaso is a madrigal comedy, or commedia harmonica, by the Italian composer Orazio Vecchi, first published in 1597. Its sequence of polyphonic vocal pieces portrays stock characters and situations associated with commedia dell'arte, including comic lovers, servants, and regional caricatures....

Con che soavità is a solo vocal work by Claudio Monteverdi, published in his Seventh Book of Madrigals in 1619. Written for a high voice with nine instruments arranged as three separate instrumental groups, it alternates and combines contrasting sonorities around the singer. The piece exemplifies Mo...

Sfogava con le stelle is a five-voice madrigal by Claudio Monteverdi, published in his Fourth Book of Madrigals in 1603. It sets a poem by Ottavio Rinuccini in which a sleepless lover addresses the stars and laments an unresponsive beloved. Monteverdi uses changes of texture, dissonance, repetition,...

Dolcissima mia vita is a five-voice Italian madrigal by Carlo Gesualdo, published in his Fifth Book of Madrigals in 1611. Its anonymous text addresses a beloved whose desired death-dealing kiss would transform suffering into sweetness. Gesualdo's setting is noted for abrupt chromatic shifts, dissona...

This madrigal, “Lamento della ninfa,” composed by Claudio Monteverdi in Book VIII (1638), is a significant work of Baroque music. It features a soprano lamenting over lost love set against a complex repeating ground bass supported by two tenors and a bass. The piece established key elements of the m...

Published in Luzzaschi's Madrigali per cantare et sonare (Rome, 1601), composed for the celebrated concerto delle donne, three virtuoso ladies of the Ferrara Este court.

"Tempro la cetra" is a work by Claudio Monteverdi published at the beginning of his Seventh Book of Madrigals in 1619. It sets a text by Giambattista Marino in which a singer prepares his lyre for martial subject matter but turns instead to love. Written for tenor with instrumental accompaniment, it...

O Mirtillo is a five-voice madrigal by Claudio Monteverdi, published in his Fifth Book of Madrigals in 1605. Its text comes from Giovanni Battista Guarini's pastoral drama Il pastor fido and voices a lament addressed to the shepherd Mirtillo. The work belongs to the repertory associated with Monteve...

"Luci serene e chiare" is a five-voice Italian madrigal by Carlo Gesualdo, published in his Fourth Book of Madrigals in 1596. The text praises the beloved's serene, bright eyes and contrasts images of light, pleasure, wounds, and death, giving the composer opportunities for close musical illustratio...

"What is our life?" is a five-voice English madrigal by Orlando Gibbons, published in The First Set of Madrigals and Motets in 1612. It sets a poem traditionally attributed to Sir Walter Raleigh that compares human existence to a theatrical performance, with the grave serving as the curtain after th...