This disc of Iberian and Latin American Renaissance music is a reissue cleverly disguised as a new release. It compiles music from several recordings by Catalonian visionary Jordi Savall, his luminous-voiced collaborator Montserrat Figueras, and his Hesperion XXI and Capella Reial de Catalunya ensembles, dressing them up with a new set of rather philosophical booklet notes on themes of change, of intercultural tolerance, and of the evolving nature of Christianity in the Iberian realm and in New Spain. Some might call this a cynical ploy, but actually Savall has always been moving in a circle, so to speak, spiraling inward toward a deeper musical understanding of the historical themes touched on here: the lingering effects of the legacy of medieval Iberia and its "mestissage" or mixture of cultures, the reign of Holy Roman Emperor Charles (Carlos) V (did you know that he was both the first monarch to be called "His Majesty" and the first to be honored with the claim that the "sun never set" on his empire?), and the relationships between cultivated and popular styles, both in Iberia and the New World.

Nothing or next to nothing was known about Monsieur de Sainte-Colombe – not even his first name – and the mystery surrounding his person only intensified the mystery of his music: the Concerts à deux violes, which are the only pieces that have come down to us. He was known to violists as the inventor of the seventh string that was added to the bass viol of the Baroque era in France. It was gathered that he had two daughters because he was known to have given concerts with them. And Titon du Tillet had recounted the pleasing story of Marin Marais coming to listen to his master in secret, hidden under the hut in a mulberry tree where the latter “played the viol more peacefully and more delectably”.

This interpretation is a perfect match to Savall's equally beautiful Art of the Fugue. Here you find even more variety in the blend of instruments. I am not going to have only one version of this music and my first recommendation is Münchinger's more emotional recording on Decca. When it comes to colourful instrumentation, however, Savall is the winner, and the direction & playing needs no justification, it is simply wonderful, even if I doubt this folk music style reflects the spirit of the baroque era.

In the monastic life of the Cistercian order, as in the case of the female monastery of Santa María la Real de Las Huelgas (Burgos), a royal pantheon, the seat of coronations and the epicentre of a very intense musical life in which singing played an extremely important part, the nuns were called upon to live a life of simplicity, silence, prayer and contemplation. Flavit auster, which is part of the Las Huelgas Codex, is a Marian text inspired in the Song of Songs in which the most powerful symbols of femininity appear, such as the honeycomb, milk and honey, and protectiveness described as “mother of mercy, port of hope for the shipwrecked and virgin mother purified.”

Farnace was apparently one of Vivaldi's favorite operas, because he mounted numerous productions in various cities, and wrote six versions of the score, more than of any of his other operas. The conventions of operatic vocal characterizations that came to be standard – higher voices in the sympathetic roles, and lower voices in villainous roles – had not yet been established, and Farnace features a baritone and contralto in the heroic roles, with a soprano as the villain. Soprano Adriana Fernández shines as the wicked Berenice, who is redeemed at the very last minute. She has a full, creamy voice that she deploys appealing agility and warmth.

It is extremely difficult nowadays to reproduce the sound castrato singers where capable of doing at their time and, too often, one finds voices that are too nasal or merely good falsettos. But in many of the performances in this CD one can let the imagination wander and almost imagine you are in the 18th century. In particular, the performance of James Bowmann is outstanding. Also very special the performace of Charpentier 'Salve Regina' by Gerard Lesne and the others; this of course enhanced by the exquisite sensibility of the director Jordi Saval. Also, the duo of Derek Lee Ragin and Ewa Mallas-Godlewska in 'Son qual nave ch'agitata' is so exquisite it brings tears to your eyes.

Orlando Gibbons was one of the most important composers active in England during the early 17th century. Descended from a family of musicians, he spent the last few years of his life as organist at Westminster Abbey. In 1613 he published a selection of fine keyboard music in the volume called Parthenia. In addition to his own pieces he also added some by those other emblematic figures of the time, William Byrd and John Bull. In his brief life, he was not able to compose as much music as his more famous contemporaries, but he has since through his music attained the status of a "musicians’ musician"; one whose music far transcends that of most composers of the time.

Jordi Savall releases his first Schubert album, following a recording of Beethoven’s complete symphonies which largely contributed to renew our vision of the early Romantic repertoire. The Catalan maestro delivers a recording freed from the weight of past traditions to underline the dynamics, the section balance and the timbres that are required in this repertoire. Jordi Savall decided to entitle this album Transfiguration, because, as he explains, we are always astonished at Schubert’s ability to reach this essentially internal and spiritual dimension, this kind of Transfiguration, which he simply sums up as follows in his diary in 1824: ‘My production is the result of my musical knowledge and my pain’ or, to quote a poem he wrote a little earlier: ‘When I wanted to sing love, it turned into pain. When I wanted to sing pain, it turned into love.’

John Dowland was no less famous for his misfortunes than for his works. This subtle, elusive and strangely-behaved character led rather an adventurous life. Hailed as an Anglorum Orpheus (or “Orpheus of the English”) of almost divine powers, he inspired more comments and praise than most great musicians of his generation. To comply with legend, we were to associate him only with tears, sleep and gloom, in the gallery of Shakespearian heroes he could be placed somewhere between Hamlet and Jaques in As You like It. Although the legend may be partly based on truth, the musician himself contributed a great deal to it in his various writings; these are the confessions of a man full of dissonances, at once vulnerable and ambitious, ingenuous and haughty – an egocentric ever at odds with a world by which he felt himself rejected.

Jenkins was relatively unknown, having spent most of his life quietly in the employ of wealthy landowners in Cambridgeshire and Norfolk up to the Restoration, when he took up a court appointment as a lutenist. His pupil-patrons Sir Nicholas and Roger L'Estrange and Roger North were, however, much quoted figures of the period.

Purcell’s fifteen Fantazias have come down to us as a manuscript kept at the British Museum, most of whose pieces are dated. As they would not have aroused any interest at the time, the young composer did not even attempt to have them published, and they only appeared in print, edited by Peter Warlock, in 1927! This unique collection of pieces of from three to seven parts, a true “sum” of polyphonic thinking, to which only Bach’s Musical Offering and Art of Fugue may be compared, are the product, incredible as it may seem, of a very young composer of twenty-one at the beginning of his all too-short career. Written during the summer of 1680, they bring two centuries of uninterrupted instrumental tradition in England to a crowning conclusion.

On 10th December, 1553, at one of the highpoints in the Golden Age of Spanish music, there appeared in Rome the TRATTADO DE GLOSAS SOBRE CLAUSULAS Y OTROS GENEROS DE PUNTOS EN LA MUSICA DE VIOLONES NUEVAMENTE PUESTOS EN LUZ by Diego Ortiz, who was also known under the name “el Toledano”. An inevitable reference point for the study of instrumental performance practice in the 16th century, this work is of exceptional interest, both for its purely historical significance and for its artistic value, since it contains the finest examples of the known repertoire for viola da gamba (vihuela de arco or violone) and harpsichord in the Renaissance period.

Morales's five-part setting of the Requiem is one of the masterpieces of the 16th century and was actually published twice during his lifetime. The 'Missa pro defunctis' follows the customary pattern of the time. Each section begins with a unison Gregorian intonation, which then continues as a cantus firmus in the upper part as the other voices spin a polyphonic texture underneath. The work avoids obvious madrigalisms, but maintains an austere, meditative texture, which is both spiritual and moving.

Marais's Alcione is the last great 'tragedy' in music from the reign of Louis XIV. It is a total spectacle at the crossroads of the 17th and 18th centuries, from which it takes the mythological source, it's praise of the sovereign's glory and the literary requirement to combine choreography and stage movements. Jordi Savall rediscovered this work and brought it back to life for the first stage production in Paris since 1771.