Sweelinck: Works For Harpsichord / Rotaru

ALINA ROTARU

Alina Rotaru's debut solo recording with keyboard music of J. P. Sweelinck (1562 - 1626), a virtuosic as much as a personal approach to the music of this great Flemish composer. Brilliant debut of a highly talented young artist. This recording does not strive to present Sweelinck's harpsichord repertoire in its completeness but rather to mark an inner journey into the universe of the enlightened and cosmopolitan musician Sweelinck was. Nominated for ICMA 2011!
"I have no hesitation in recommending the present Carpe Diem CD as the ideal place to start one’s exploration of Sweelinck’s harpsichord music. […] Alina Rotaru is a young Romanian harpsichordist who currently resides in Bremen, Germany. On the booklet cover her photograph shows a rather serious-looking young lady—perhaps the cares of the world are weighing down heavily on her. She can rest assured, however, that with playing as accomplished as this, she has a brilliant career ahead for her. Her keyboard work in the Fantasia chromatica is amazing. She starts out slowly and deliberately and then builds to a spectacular finish; the sweeping thirty-second note runs in the concluding section will take your breath away. The Ballet del granduca, often heard on organ recitals, is likewise given the grand treatment. Every tune is gauged perfectly, including the one that gives the CD its title, Fortune My Foe.[…] The music of this era contains many fascinating cross references and borrowings, nowhere more apparent than in the pieces that Rotaru has so aptly selected for this program. Rotaru succeeds in this repertoire where others fail thanks to a rock-steady rhythmic pulse and honest, self-effacing musicianship. Although it’s often difficult to put a finger on it, her style is exactly right. I never got the feeling, for example, that she plays this music because it’s historically “important”; she plays it because she believes in it. The music comes through with all its brilliance and structural complexity intact, high praise indeed for any performer. Urgently reccomnded." C. Brodersen / Fanfare Magazine May/June 2011

Price: $27.98