Giovanni Battista Sammartini was a leading
figure in eighteenth century musical life in Milan. He was
known and rated in particular for his symphonies, of which
two (J-C 25, in E flat major, and J-C 56 in G minor) appear
here. But he also wrote church music – he was a maestro di
cappela and so wrote a Mass and eight cantatas for the Congregation
of the Most Holy Sepulchre of Our Lord Jesus Christ and the
Solitude of the Most Holy Sorrowing Virgin, which worshipped
at the Jesuit church of San Fedele. The cantatas were all
written for three solo voices, and include recitatives and
arias.
The cantata
Gerusalemme Sconoscente
Ingrata (
Jerusalem, ungrateful and disowning), dating
from 1759, opens this disc. The performance is an accomplished
one – the orchestra is lively and spirited, although the
music is not desperately exciting, the acoustic of the
Sala dei Congressi di Villa Vigoni, Loveno di Menaggio
in Como was rather too reverberant, and I was not completely
convinced by all the soloists. Mezzo-soprano Miroslava
Yordanova is good, with her fairly dramatic, mature voice,
but soprano Silvia Mapelli doesn’t really create enough
power – it is too slight and soft a voice, not robust enough.
I was also disappointed by Giorgio Tiboni, who came across
as rather strained – his voice might work well for Italian
opera, but his rather strangled, far from pretty sounds,
do not really work in sublime church music, nor did I enjoy
him in the following work. The
Confitebor is a contrafactum,
setting text from Psalm 110 to the music of an aria from
the cantata
L’addolorata divina madre. The (short)
symphonies are very pleasant works, with elegant and assured
composition, and performances here full of conviction and
energy. The Presto of the Symphony in G minor brought the
disc to a joyful conclusion. Rather mixed works and performances,
but the orchestra and conductor at least cannot be faulted.
Other sacred cantatas by Sammartini are
available on Naxos
8.557431,
8.557432 and
8.570254.
Em Marshall
see also review by Glyn
Pursglove
Silvia Mapelli
(soprano); Miroslava Yordanova (mezzo); Giorgio Tiboni (tenor) 
