Castaldi: Ferita d'amore - Musiche in habito tiorbesco di Be

Fragrant, intimate, life-affirming, poetical, utterly lyrical. Anyone seeking sanctuary from the stresses of modern life could do much worse than listen to Bellerofonte Castaldi's beautiful music and be wafted back to a time long before mobile phones, cars, pop stars and billions of people all competing with each other for attention and the planet's resources. This recital provides an hour's worth of direct nourishment for the soul and the senses.   Most of the pieces are for theorbo solo or theorbo and theorbino duet, all of these coming from Castaldi's 1622 collection, Capricci a due Stromenti. The two items for voice and theorbo, the first of which does not appear until the second half of the recital, come from his 1623 publication, Il Primo Mazzetto di Fiori Musicalmente Colti dal Giardino Bellerofonteo ('The First Bouquet of Flowers Musically Gathered from the Bellerofontean Garden'). That garden metaphor is apt: Castaldi's pieces are the musical equivalent of warm evening s