Gli Angeli Genève & l'OSR by De Machaut, Stravinsky, Gesualdo, From (2024/2024), Conductor Stephan MacLeod, Victoria Hall, Geneva, Switzerland

Although created in this temple of opera that is La Scala in Milan under the direction of Ernest Ansermet in 1948, the Mass belongs to the last period of Stravinsky. Designed to be part of the Roman Catholic liturgy, it is deliberately “cold, absolutely cold” with an extreme and austere starkness. At that time, Stravinsky became passionate about the Ars nova musicians of the 14th century, and in particular the Messe de Nostre-Dame by Guillaume de Machault. About ten years later, when he began to use the serial technique, he discovered the strange music of Carlo Gesualdo and completed Tres Sacrae cantiones left unfinished, then he arranged three madrigals for the 400th anniversary of the birth of the Neapolitan composer in the form of a Monumentum pro Gesualdo da Venosa created at the Doge's Palace in Venice in 1960, then choreographed by George Balanchine for his New York City Ballet. It is a great opportunity to hear during this concert the sources, then the realization that they inspired to one of the greatest composers of the 20th century in works that have remained very confidential.