Stradella’s music is of the highest quality, and as such receives more and more attention nowadays. Superb performances on period instruments by Harmonices Mundi/Claudio Astronio and the great Swedish soprano Susanne Rydén.

The tireless pilgrimage of Llull to spread their Ars seems to nurture with new energy as are major the obstacles that cross the road. Llull wants to be present in all places and moments in the turbulent events of the 13th to 14th siecles transition. The news that the Mongols, allied with the Armenian Christians had attacked Muslim positions in Syria leads him directly to Cyprus, Armenia and the Holy Land. The last stages of his long life journey, protagonists of this album, set up one of the most representative combination of Llull and his ideas: an amalgam of music that joins sounds from Mediterranean coasts, the privileged space of Ramon Llull’s actions.

Presented by the Festival della Valle d’Itria, this is the first modern-day staging of Leonardo Leo’s Neapolitan revision of Handel’s Rinaldo, a pastiche with a Mediterranean allure, which was composed in 1718 but considered lost until a few years ago. The story behind this rare opera is fascinating: the score of Handel’s masterpiece was brought illegally to Naples by the castrato singer Nicolò Grimaldi, who had performed Rinaldo in London. Once in Italy, the work was given a makeover by local composers, including Leo, who adapted it to the taste of the Neapolitan public, adding intermezzos and amusing characters.