Vivaldi, the Organ, and a New Record Label (english version)

 Album of the month of August 2025 

The birth of a new record label in the field of classical music is always to be welcomed with joy, as well as with admiration for the courage shown by those who embark on such an initiative at a time hardly favourable to the promotion of products devoted to culture and art. Thus, in the firmament of record labels, a new star has appeared: the Swiss label inAures (website: www.inaures.art), a highly stimulating and promising name if we consider that in Latin in aures means “into the ears.” The first release of this new venture to reach “our ears” is dedicated to Antonio Vivaldi, in a CD housed in an elegant, refined cardboard case and further enriched by a booklet that is in fact more like a volume, to which I shall return later. The title of this inaugural recording is Il suono ritrovato (“The Rediscovered Sound”) and features works by the Red Priest with “obbligato organ.” The five concertos, the sonata, and an aria from Juditha Triumphans selected for the program were recorded by the young conductor and organist Giulio De Nardo, violinist Claudio Rado, oboist Priska Comploi, contralto Francesca Ascioti, and the members of the ensemble Sestier Armonico.

At first glance, as Giulio De Nardo rightly explains—he is the author of the highly interesting accompanying notes, alongside an essay by Michael Talbot, the foremost scholar of Antonio Vivaldi’s life and works, and a section devoted to the presentation of the two historic organs used for the recording—the organ is never normally associated with the aesthetic and musical conception of the “Red Priest.” Instrumentally, it was above all the string family (violin and cello) and, to a lesser extent, the woodwinds (oboe and bassoon) that dictated the Venetian composer’s choices in concertos and sonatas. Yet this does not mean that Vivaldi ignored the rich timbral palette and the sonority of the organs of his time, which, including those of the Venetian area, were undergoing an undeniable phase of technical evolution. As Michael Talbot explains very clearly in his essay included in the booklet, the Red Priest was not only thoroughly familiar with organs but also greatly appreciated their sound, particularly because of their capacity to surprise listeners with their colours—a quality that aligns perfectly with Vivaldi’s compositional style. His works aimed, through the skilful distribution of instruments and their interplay during performances, to astonish and delight audiences, especially in the concerts held with the female orchestra of the Ospedale della Pietà in Venice. However, Italian-built organs lacked, unlike their German and French counterparts, a complete pedalboard, which limited the production of the lower notes to be played with the feet.

Yet this limitation was mitigated in the Venetian organ-building tradition of the eighteenth century by certain features that distinguished the instruments of the Serenissima’s school, the result of exceptional local craftsmanship. This mastery was evident in the careful selection of Dolomite woods for the construction of windchests, keyboards, and wooden pipes, the forging of iron to improve mechanical transmissions, the alloying of tin and lead for the making of metal pipes, and the tanning of leather to produce durable and flexible bellows. This is why Venetian organs built in the eighteenth century, with their rich palette of colours and nuances, are still remembered in the history of keyboard instruments.

Here lies the aim of the recording with which the Swiss label inAures made its debut: in the name of a precise and historically informed approach, Giulio De Nardo and the other performers chose to record these Vivaldian pages with organo obbligato by relying on two historic instruments. The first is an anonymous eighteenth-century Venetian organ housed in Lonigo; the second, built between 1732 and 1733 by Giacinto Pescetti, was originally intended for the church of SS. Biagio e Cataldo on the Giudecca in Venice, but later relocated to the church of San Giacomo Apostolo in Polcenigo (province of Pordenone) following the Napoleonic prohibitions of the early nineteenth century.

These two instruments thus reproduce the very sound to which Vivaldi was accustomed and on which he based his compositions that included obbligato organ, a sound completely different from that of more modern instruments, especially the so-called a cassapanca organs, which the Red Priest never heard or used. Accordingly, Giulio De Nardo employed the anonymous Venetian organ of Lonigo for the Concerto for Oboe, Violin, Organ, Strings and Basso Continuo in C major, RV 554; the Concertos for Violin, Organ, Strings and Basso Continuo in D minor, RV 541; in F major, RV 767; in C minor, RV 766; and in F major, RV 542. He then turned to Pescetti’s organ for the Sonata for Violin, Oboe, Organ, and Chalumeau ad libitum, RV 779 and for the aria Noli, o cara, te adorantis from Juditha Triumphans, RV 644.

This historical and philological attention has undoubtedly yielded an outstanding result, in the sense that the timbre, sonorities, and depth provided by the colors of these two organs contributed decisively to enhancing all the other instruments, beginning with the solo violin and oboe called upon in the Vivaldian works under consideration. It must be remembered that at the time—as was also the case with the contemporary Neapolitan school—the compositions of the Venetian school, and in particular those of the Red Priest, possessed an extraordinary peculiarity: the ability to create in the listener an impression of spatiality that went far beyond the purely acoustic dimension. It was a kind of “imaginative illusion” which, in Vivaldi’s case, was undeniably enlivened by his compositional stratagems—namely, the sudden, almost theatrical coup de théâtre by which the various instruments interacted with one another, joining or separating, emerging or fading, strengthening or loosening, widening or narrowing the spatial dimension in which the sound unfolded. This was analogous to what eighteenth-century Venetian painting revealed to the eye: a sense of infinite space, as in the vast canvases of Canaletto, Guardi, or Tiepolo, where the observer’s gaze can see, or “imagine” seeing, what is not in fact physically present in form or colour.

Thus, the presence of the obbligato organ represented an additional value, a way to better exploit this illusion of spatiality that came to life in the very act of listening. From this perspective, the choice of historically appropriate and reliable instruments becomes clearer, as it helps to recreate what may rightly be called the “Vivaldi sound.”

Here, in addressing this very sound, the uniqueness, value, and artistic and cultural depth of this recording lie in the performers’ ability—without exception—to immerse themselves in this imaginative sonic dimension, almost as if it were the emanation of a theatrical reality in which instrumental sound becomes a character capable of radiating spatiality poised between composition and painting.

Beyond his contribution as organist, Giulio De Nardo’s importance as conductor must be recognized and praised “behind the scenes.” His effectiveness, as I perceived while listening to this recording, resides less in the gesture of execution itself than in the preparatory work, the creation of the right “setting.” The act of performance is in truth only the final link in a chain: before it came the need to identify the interpretative choices, the gestures and sensitivities expressed by the soloists and by the ensemble, in which individual freedom had to be perfectly interwoven so as to bring out that characteristic rhythmic breath which defines the music of the Red Priest.

It must be said clearly: this was a journey back in time, a musical adventure detached from the petty cruelties of the present, an oasis of beauty that further reveals the uniqueness of Vivaldi’s music—despite Stravinsky’s mocking definition of it in his day.

This for the artistic side; now let us turn to the technical. When one has at least a decent sound system and the recording is handled by Paolo Carrer, as in this case, one can be certain of listening to an entirely reliable production. The main challenge here lay in capturing the subtle timbral balance between solo instruments, ensemble, and the two organs, considering the essential differences in sound that distinguish the latter.

Starting with dynamics, what strikes first is the transparency achieved, supported by remarkable energy and as revealed in the organs’ phrasing, undeniable speed. From these results a soundstage that changes—rightly so—according to where the recording was made, in Lonigo or in Polcenigo, since spatial perception varies depending on the precision of the microphone placement in these two venues. The positioning of instruments and performers is set at a moderate depth, but what truly matters is the sound’s ability to radiate both in height and in width relative to the physical placement of the speakers. One also distinctly perceives the air—that is, the distance—between the performers, which sharpens the overall focus.

The parameter of tonal balance is likewise excellent. Capturing an organ’s sound accurately is no small task but doing so while relating it to the other instruments it plays alongside is even more difficult. Yet the registers of both keyboard instruments never obscure, cover, or worse, cancel those of the others, allowing in tutti passages for their dialogue to be distinctly perceived, without the slightest blurring between the upper and lower-middle ranges.

Finally, detail. Here too, there is no disappointment from possible shortcomings: the material dimension is of the highest level, with a fine grain, precisely detailed in the three-dimensional projection of the instruments. This is due to the considerable amount of “black” surrounding instruments and performers, making their presence in the listening space almost palpable, almost tactile.

In view of such a result, this recording is designated “Disc of the Month for August” by MusicVoice.

Andrea Bedetti

Antonio Vivaldi – Il suono ritrovato. Works with obbligato Organ

Claudio Rado (violin) – Priska Comploi (oboe) – Francesca Ascioti (contralto) – Sestier Armonico – Giulio De Nardo (organ and conductor)

CD inAures CD2501

Artistic rating 5/5
Technical rating 5/5