Giovanni Morandi: Complete Organ Works Vol. 3

Giovanni Morandi is one of the most important composers of organ music in nineteenth-century Italy. After an initial period of formation under his father’s guidance, he spent twenty years of his life as the husband of a famous singer, following her in her tours but also weaving important relationships throughout Europe; at his wife’s death, he retired in Senigallia, in the Marche region, where he focused on composition and on animating the city’s musical life. This Da Vinci Classics Album, which is volume 3 of the complete recording of Morandi’s organ works, comprises Part II (Books 4, 5, 6) of Morandi’s Gran Raccolta di Sonate, plus a Christmas Pastorale and a spectacular organ “symphony” where unusual and creative timbral solutions are called for. These three pieces were all written between 1822 and 1825, i.e. around the time of Morandi’s wife’s death. They therefore display his youthful interest in an “orchestral” treatment of the organ, with constant imitations of orchestral instruments.