Caldara: The Cervantes Operas La Ritirata & Josetxu Obregon

• 1 Introduction 03:37
• 2 Aria: Per tanti obbligazioni Signor 02:27
• 3 Recitative: Da si austera virtu tuo cor 01:00
• 4 Aria: Quel cor, che non voglio 04:00
• 5 Aria 01:22
• 6 Entre 01:16
• 7 Gigue 00:55
• 8 Menueto 01:12
• 9 Aria: Si labbiamo, Ricciardetto 04:24
• 10 Aria: Penso di gia che appena 04:36
• 11 Aria: Giache debe andar cosi 03:17
• 12 Aria per li Vilani I 01:29
• 13 Aria per Burlar sanco panco 01:11
• 14 Aria per li Vilani II 01:52
• 15 Aria per li Bacanti 01:02
• 16 Tempo di Passapie 02:26
• 17 Aria: Per li Satiri 01:25
• 18 Aria grotesca 01:15
• 19 Recitative: Sancio amico 01:47
• 20 Aria: Primieramente, Sancio, abbi timore 04:45
• 21 Aria: Addio, Signor Padrone 03:56
• 22 Aria 00:53
• 23 Act II: Recitative: Scoperto, e in odio 00:38
• 24 Act II: Aria: Confida al vento la sua speranza 03:02
• 25 Act IV: Aria: Venga pure in campo armato 04:09
• 26 Act V: Aria: A dispetto del vento, e dellonda 05:01
• 27 Aria I 02:12
• 28 Aria II 01:14
• 29 Sarabanda 02:07
• 30 Tempo di Ciacona 01:24
• Total Runtime 01:09:54

Info for Caldara: The Cervantes Operas

In commemoration of the 400th anniversary of the death of Miguel de Cervantes, La Ritirata and Josetxu Obregón have created a programme for Glossa sallying forth on the back of music composed by Antonio Caldara and inspired by El ingenioso hidalgo Don Quijote de la Mancha.

Antonio Caldara was neither the first nor the last composer to have his compositional ingenuity sparked off by Cervantes’ timeless masterpiece. He may well have been propelled forwards by his own experiencing the Spanish soundscape within a century of the publication of the two parts of the Don Quijote: Barcelona was a working “port of call” for Caldara after Mantua and Rome and before Vienna. For the Viennese court he wrote a pair of operas (with librettos by GC Pasquini): Don Chisciotte in Corte della Duchessa and Sancio Panza Governatore dell’isola Barattaria, and from these works Obregón – like Caldara also a cellist – has put together a selection of arias.

Soloists María Espada, Emiliano González Toro and João Fernandes invest their abundant collective artistry in bringing to life a rapid series of Cervantine characters, not least the Spanish knight and his squire. Interspersed between these vocal contributions are a series of instrumental ballets composed for these operas by Nicola Matteis, who also worked at the Viennese court. In the booklet essay Begoña Lolo and Adela Presas set the scene for Caldara’s contribution to the musical legacy of Don Quixote.

María Espada, soprano
Emiliano González Toro, tenor
João Fernandes, bass
La Ritirata
Hiro Kurosaki, concertmaster
Josetxu Obregón, artistic direction

Josetxu Obregón
Born in Bilbao, he studied cello, chamber music and conducting at Bachelor and Masters level in Spain and Holland, where he studied baroque cello at the Royal Conservatory of The Hague and was mentored by Anner Bylsma.

Josetxu performs on a regular basis at the most prestigious concert halls in 18 different European countries, the United States, Mexico, Chile, Costa Rica, Bolivia, Japan and China; at venues such as the Concertgebouw Amsterdam, Tokyo Opera City, Centro Nacional de las Artes de México, the Royal Festival Hall London. He has played with some of Europe’s most important ensembles, such as the Royal Concertgebouw Orchestra, and in the context of Early Music with Le Concert des Nations (Jordi Savall), Orchestra of the Age of Enlightenment and as first cellist of L’Arpeggiata (Christina Pluhar), EUBO (European Union Baroque Orchestra) and Arte dei Suonatori, among others.

He has recorded for Virgin, Verso, Arsis, Columna Música and The Gift of Music record labels and also for BBC3, NPS Radio 3 Holland, Mezzo, the Spanish National Radio and TV and the Macedonian TV, among others.

Josetxu plays an original 1740 cello by Sebastian Klotz and recently he had the honor to play at the Palacio Real de Madrid the Stradivarius 1700 that belongs to the Spanish Royal Collection.

Booklet for Caldara: The Cervantes Operas