Release Date: 05 September 2025
Label: Voces8 Records
Packaging Type: Digipak
No of Units: 1
Barcode: 5060140212706
Genres: Classical Early Music
Composer/Series: Astrophil & Stella
Description
'Astrophil & Stella' is the fruit of a life's devotion to the spirit and craft of 17th-century music. Harpsichordist, conductor, and composer Patrick Ayrton has delved into the intricate fabric of this era's compositions, unearthing its hidden mechanisms and timeworn secrets. The result is a song cycle of his own, for soprano and instrumental ensemble. Historically, the art of composing was not merely a skill but the very lifeblood of every musician, and to compose was to speak the language of the present. Thus, Patrick does not aim to simply revive the past, but to rekindle a tradition, one that hovers between memory and reinvention. In his hands, ancient forms breathe anew, woven with reverence, yet subtly imbued with his own artistic voice.
He writes: "I believe that the line between improvisation and composition is a fragile, blurry and undefined one. Could some of the great works not simply be the crystallising of numerous extemporisations? The fact is that after many decades of "inventing at the keyboard" (with a considerate dose of trial and error!), I began, in 2022, for the first time, to set things to paper, with Purcell and his contemporaries as a main source of inspiration. Born of an enduring fascination with this repertoire, Astrophil & Stella is a love letter to the English Baroque - with its sinuous melodies, refined ambiguities of modulation, and tender reminiscences of old folk ballads - qualities that have long inspired me."
All these elements converge in a joyful tribute, at once intimate and expansive, deeply rooted yet untethered by time.
Patrick Ayrton: harpsichord & organ
Lauren Lodge-Campbell: soprano
Louise Ayrton: violin
Salomé Gasselin: viola da gamba
Marie Bournisien: harp
Tracklisting
Davina Clarke
Daniela Mars & Paul Smith
Daniela Mars
VOCES8
Thomas Elwin and Lana Bode
Daniela Mars
Apollo5
Paul Smith
Into the Winds
Patrick Ayrton
A Due Liuti
Rowan Pierce; Florilegium; Ashley Solomon
Capella de Ministrers
RossoPorpora; Walter Testolin
Clematis
InAlto; Lambert Colson; Bernard Foccroulle
