I Fagiolini
Fire and Ashes – Chandos
“Under Hollingworth’s inspired direction, the singers squeeze all the emotion possible out of the suspensions.”
Gramophone, May 2008
“This is a disc to be relished as much for its sudden contrasts as for the ensemble's unfailingly spirited, idiomatic performances.”
Independent, February 2008
“The singing and playing are wonderfully sensitive and acute. It's classy, provocative stuff.”
The Guardian, February 2008
The Full Monteverdi – Film Premiere
“Fantastic! I wish the word ‘brilliant’ had not been so overused, so that I could summon it to prasie this film….The musical component here could compete with the best recordings made, but there is no competition for what this is: a stroke of genius that defines a genre, something that sets a standard for what can be done. This is a way to open the treasures of this great music to our literal-minded and lazy age…..If you love Monteverdi, get this. If you think you might like his music, get it. If you’ve tried to listen to Monteverdi, but haven’t quite managed to get into it, get it. If you’ve never heard Monteverdi get it.”
American Record Guide, June 08
“This astonishing film, here screened in public for the first time, is based on John La Bouchardière’s collaboration with I Fagiolini, and charts the emotional progress of six failing couples through the deeply moving music of Monteverdi’s Fourth Book of Madrigals. This remarkable, intricately constructed film is aesthetically beautiful in every aspect: masterfully shot, sensitively arranged images, utterly glorious singing, impressive operatic acting, and a terrifyingly involving narrative flow. This encounter between yesterday’s music and today’s medium can’t help but deliver Monteverdi’s masterpieces to a new and deeply appreciative audience in a thoroughly spectacular fashion.”
Classical Source, October 07
"Bouchardière's verité-style direction, reminiscent of Kieslowski in its bold opening silence and unrelenting in its emotional delivery, has the makings of an award winner."
Early Music Today, October 07
‘Death, Dance and Salad’ – St George’s Bristol
“For all the humour, the programme worked beautifully because of the deadly serious musicianship that is I Fagiolini's gold standard”....” The fine tone of Anna Crookes' soprano put a gloss on the Fagiolini sound, with Robert Hollingworth's countertenor, Nicholas Hurndall Smith's tenor and Thomas Guthrie's baritone all coming to the fore in turn. Bean salads rarely come as good as this.”
The Guardian, September 07
The Full Monteverdi – LSO St Luke’s
“Together, they produced a sound experience that left us in no doubt that, this evening, we had heard a work of genius – a work of rich humanity, suggesting that music itself was born in song. This was I Fagiolini’s last appearance (with TFM) in England. We shall all be the poorer for its passing, wondering how best the splendour and ardour of Monteverdi may be conveyed in such an immediate fashion again.”
Classical Source, July 07
The Full Monteverdi – Lincoln Center Festival, New York
“More than a modern-dress performance of an opera ever could, the concept posited Monteverdi as our contemporary. The performers for "The Full Monteverdi" weren't simply dressed as we were (eerily so, anticipating the exact measure of casualness of the Kaplan crowd) — they were in our very midst. It was a viscerally effective way of telling us that the emotions Monteverdi described are our emotions; his world is our world.”
Opera News, October 07
“The main dividend of this staging is that the listeners are surrounded by the individual strands of Monteverdi’s polyphony. And with a performance this good, that’s a spectacular place to be.”
The New York Times, July 07
”Though the miming of lovelorn angst grew redundant, the exquisite interplay of voices easily surmounted the staging's novelty: A phrase lolled from tenor to baritone to bass, and mezzo and tenor trilled the pace of a rare rapid tempo; bass Giles Underwood lead into one madrigal with astonishingly faint dexterity; and the ensemble concluded a late number with delicious precision before picking up the next with breathtaking, pulse-stilling beauty. By the production's conclusion, Mr. La Bouchardière's mute actors stormed off for good, leaving the penthouse to I Fagiolini's ravished and ravishing singers.”
The New York Sun, July 07
“The group's founder and music director, Robert Hollingworth, achieved the virtually impossible in forging a tight, well-tuned ensemble out of singers who are spread across a crowded room and can hardly hear each other…I admire people willing to take such risks, and the first notes of the performance made me fall instantly in love. After which, my response went through the cycles of a brief romance: excitement, wonder, doubt and irritation.”
Newsday.com, July 07
“I Fagiolini's vocalism was as affecting as it was attractive, with beautiful tuning and a natural male-female blend typical of English groups. Most impressive was the cohesion, particularly as the singers were performing subtle, complex music from memory and across the room from one another… Most of all, "The Full Monteverdi" helps the audience get closer to the original heat these madrigals gave off. The language may be foreign and the idiom centuries old, but this musical theater works like a mirror, with love and its discords hitting close to home.”
The Star Ledger, July 07
The Full Monterverdi - audience responses
“You all provided one of the richest experiences of my life, last night. You are all consummate musicians, as well as gorgeous actors, and I cannot tell you how deeply moved I was. This was a blessed performance!”
“I had the good fortune to attend last night's performance of THE FULL MONTEVERDI as part of the Lincoln Center Festival. It was one of the great classical music evenings I have had in my many years of concert (and opera and theatre) going. The overpowering feeling I had, ultimately, is of having been 'one' with the singers and actors - with music passing thru one to the other performers. Quite extraordinary.”
Abu Gosh Festival, Jerusalem
“The group's enchanting voices, perfect coordination, pure intonation and clear enunciation were a rare aesthetic pleasure.”
The Jerusalem Post, June 06
Spitalfields Music Festival, London
“The audience is made to feel that it is actually inside the music: stung by the biting discords, caressed by the velvety sonority of the consolatory consonances, haunted by the anguished chromatic lines, astonished by the sudden darts of harmonic daring, invigorated by the syncopated dance rhythms, and finally overwhelmed by the intensity of these miniature choral-dramas.”
The Times, June 06
Simunye – Norfolk & Norwich Festival
“A Victorian hymn was immaculately sung by I Fagiolini followed by roughly the same harmonies but with much more freedom by Sdasa Chorale to conclude a wonderful partnership in praise of song. There will be no better entertainment during the festival and certainly no event received with more enthusiasm.”
Michael Drake, May 06
The Birds - City of London Festival
“The performances are wonderfully accomplished. The sheer wit and charm of I Fagiolini's singing and acting tend to obscure the high musical standards involved in everything they do, whether it be presenting the narrative of Ravenscroft's extended partsong The Three Ravens”
“imitating taped birdsong in Norgard's D'Monstrantz Voogeli, or turning Janequin's Le Chant des Oyseaulx into a fanciful cameo of birdwatching life.”
The Guardian, July 05
The Full Monteverdi – Bury St Edmunds Festival
“The sounds were exquisite, the voices each outstanding and the acting emotional… ‘Incredible’ is an over-used word these days but I struggle to find a better one.”
Michael Drake, July 05
The Full Monteverdi – City of London Festival
“If there's a more enterprisingly theatrical vocal group than this one, I've yet to encounter it.”
The Telegraph, July 05
The Full Monteverdi - Jerusalem
“The directing idea of John La Bouchardiere is brilliant, but all of this wouldn't have happened if it wasn't for this angels singing, of these wonderful singers. The quality of the voices and their beauty, the perfect synchronization between them (despite the spread in the hall), the purity of the sounds simply caused me to trembling.”
Ora Binor, May 05
