Wigmore Hall, London
Last autumn, Magdalena Kozen� released Lettere Amorose, a disc of 17th-century madrigals with guitarist Pierre Pitzl and his ensemble Private Musicke. This recital was, basically, the concert of the album ? and that wasn't the only way in which pop conventions made themselves felt.
You could say that Private Musicke is a kind of renaissance guitar band. Plucked strings dominate the eight-player lineup, with a violone supplying resonant, sometimes syncopated bass lines. David Mayoral's stash of percussion instruments includes tambourine and high tubular bells. And indeed, at times, the ensemble's sensibilities and strumming patterns seemed borrowed from the comfortable end of rock. Somewhere, in a parallel universe not very far away, Pitzl has a band called the Heartbreakers, and Tom Petty plays a nifty galliard on the vihuela.
If it seemed a few of the music's rough edges were disappearing now and then within the honeyed harmonies, especially in instrumental numbers, Kozen�'s piquant singing kept things pointed. Her voice is agile, gleaming and direct without being huge, and this repertoire is an ideal vehicle.
One of several pieces with a Spanish inflection, Tarquino Merula's Canzonetta Spirituale Sopra all Nanna was mesmeric, Kozen� curling mournful vocal tendrils around an obsessively repeated guitar figure of only two chords. Elsewhere, she lavished as much vivacity and dramatic colour on two madrigals by Monteverdi as on virtually unknown composers, including Barbara Strozzi and Sigismondo D'India, whose setting of a lurid Tasso poem describing the embracing of a corpse had Kozen�'s voice creeping up the scale in long, controlled crescendos.
Purists might wonder how authentic Private Musicke's interpretations are; others will realize it's impossible to say, or won't even care. Who knew this repertoire could be so easy to enjoy?
Padma Lakshmi Sarah Mutch Gabrielle Union Alessandra Ambrosio Amanda Detmer
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