Dante Nova
The music in the Commedia and the Ars Nova
La Fonte Musica
Michele Pasotti lute and conduction
Elio De Capitani narrator
Francesca Cassinari, Alena Dantcheva, Alice Borciani sopranos
Gianluca Ferrarini, Massimo Altieri tenors
Marco Scavazza baritone
Matteo Bellotto basso
Efix Puleo vielle for the arm
Teodoro Baù vielle for the leg
Nathaniel Wood slide trumpet
Ermes Giussani trombone
Federica Bianchi organ and clavicymbalum
From the wailing cries and silences of Inferno to the angelic concerts of Paradiso, these programmes revisit the pages of the Divine Comedy where music resounds. Dante wrote his Comedy around the time when Philippe de Vitry and Johannes de Muris were codifying a new musical style in their respective treatises, both entitled Ars Nova Musicæand published just before Dante’s death. They introduced a different notation system and different stylistic traits, which distinguished the new style from the music of the past, both in France and in Italy. A rich and carefully selected proposal now comes from La Fonte Musica, whose artistic imperative is a “return to the sources”, the roots of the music composed during the transition from the middle ages to humanism.
