The following edition, freely downloadable for study and performance, has just been added to the Archive of Seventeenth-Century Madrigals and Arias (www.birmingham.ac.uk/ascima):
- Giovanni Valentini, Musiche concertate con voci, et istromenti, a 6, 7, 8, 9, et 10, con basso continuo (Venice, 1619) ed. Pyrros Bamichas.
The volume is provided with translations of the madrigal/aria texts into English and German, and the introduction to the volume is given in English, German and Italian. Individual works, with translations, commentary and instrumental parts where relevant, can also be downloaded separately.
This is a particularly interesting volume by the organist, later choirmaster, to the Holy Roman Emperor Ferdinand II. It contains unusual pieces, among them an exotic setting of 'Un dì soletto', and a madrigal - 'Quel augellin che canta' - accompanied by instruments including one or two clay nightingales, and it concludes with a battle piece which, intriguingly, employs musical motifs similar to those found in Monteverdi's Combattimento di Tancredi e Clorinda.