Antico: Frottole intabulate da sonare organi, libro primo (Roma 1517)

Organist and harpsichordist Maria Luisa Baldassari leads us to discover the singular figure of Andrea Antico da Montona, singular figure of musician and printer of the early Renaissance.
His great ability of engraver allowed him to compete with nothing but Ottaviano Petrucci – the undisputed prince of musical printers – and his soul as a ‘cultural entrepreneur’ led him to the courageous and pioneering operation of proposing the intavolatura (the reduction of Vocal or instrumental polyphonic compositions) for the keyboard, instead of the lute as it was in vogue at the time.
For the recording of the “Frottole Intabulate” (the frottola is the most popular Italian folk song in use between the fifteenth and sixteenth centuries), Maria Luisa Baldassari takes advantage of performing original period instruments: the spinetta, the spinetta Harpsichord, clavichord, the rare and archaic “clavisimbalum”, and the magnificent 1533 Vincenzo Colombi organ of the Chiesa del SS. Corpo di Cristo in Valvasone (Udine).