Carlo Gesualdo
MADRIGALI - LIBRI PRIMO & SECONDO
Paul Agnew
Les Arts Florissants
Harmonia Mundi, 2019
____________________
From Wikipedia:
Carlo Gesualdo da Venosa (1566-1613) was Prince of Venosa and Count of Conza. As a composer he is known for writing madrigals and pieces of sacred music that use a chromatic language not heard again until the late 19th century. He is also known for murdering his first wife and her aristocratic lover upon finding them in flagrante delicto.
The day after the killings, a delegation of Neapolitan officials inspected the room in Gesualdo's apartment where the killings had taken place, and interrogated witnesses. The delegation's report did not lack in gruesome details, including the mutilation of the corpses and, according to the witnesses, Gesualdo going into the bedroom a second time "because he wasn't certain yet they were dead."
The Gran Corte della Vicaria found Gesualdo had not committed a crime.
The responses to this and to his music have often gone hand in hand.
