LEONARDO LEO (1694-1744) Salve Regina (s.d.)
GIOVANNI BATTISTA FERRANDINI (1709-1791) Il Pianto di Maria (ca 1739)
GIOVANNI BATTISTA PERGOLESI (1710-1736) Stabat Mater (1736)
KEY’MON MURRAH, contre-ténor
IRINA SHERAZADISHVILI, contralto
LES TALENS LYRIQUES
CHRISTOPHE ROUSSET, direction
Renowned throughout eighteenth-century Europe, and whose popularity has endured to this day, Pergolesi’s Stabat Mater was composed in the final days of his life, before his untimely death at the age of twenty-six. I have already performed this work many times, both on disc and on stage, yet it is essential for me to return to it regularly, with ever greater demands and refinement. Alongside this masterpiece, I have chosen to include a cantata long attributed to Handel, but now known to be by Ferrandini, as well as Leo’s wonderful Salve Regina.
This Neapolitan repertoire belongs both to my earliest musical passions and to those that continue to inspire me today. I am deeply sensitive to its vocal style and harmonic world, and I am delighted to revisit it in the company of two exceptional artists: Key’mon Murrah and Irina Sherazadishvili. I was utterly captivated by their duet at the end of the first act of Handel’s Giulio Cesare, which we performed in Toulouse in February 2025; it was therefore only natural for me to bring them together again for this magnificent programme.
Christophe Rousset