TromboneChat

Here's the first of a few new videos of my project/ensemble Lagrime, which is the continuation of my album Scorrete lagrime mie released last year in exploring the vocal virtuosity of the baroque trombone in intimate musical settings.

This was extremely fun to record. Playing with only a voice and a theorbo as the only continuo instrument feels very exposed (there's really nowhere to hide!), but it's also very liberating, especially in terms of phrasing, shaping and ornamentation. And my two colleagues Franziska Blömer and Barbora Hulcová were just a joy to make chamber music with – very easy to communicate, and feed off and react to each other's musical ideas in real time while playing.

This video features a piece for two (soprano and/or tenor) voices by an excellent 17th-century nun composer, Sister Claudia Francesca Rusca, on a text from the Song of Songs:

I sleep, but my heart waketh: it is the voice of my beloved that knocketh, saying, Open to me, my sister, my love, my dove, my undefiled: for my head is filled with dew, and my locks with the drops of the night.

Very nice.
You make me think I should take up sackbut! (I play natural trumpet but have yet to venture into the sackbut.)
Looking forward to hearing more.
Would love to hear about your approach to temperaments, etc. in this music.
Added your album to my to listen list in Tidal and am looking forward to a relaxed listen.

cgaiii wrote: Wed Jan 14, 2026 6:33 pm Very nice.
You make me think I should take up sackbut! (I play natural trumpet but have yet to venture into the sackbut.)
Looking forward to hearing more.
Would love to hear about your approach to temperaments, etc. in this music.

You should! It's a very fun instrument and gives access to a whole type of repertoire where trumpets are not used.

Regarding temperaments, in this recording and for most of the playing I do (i.e. 16th and 17th century music), we use 1/4 meantone. Pitch here is a=466Hz.

LeTromboniste wrote: Wed Jan 14, 2026 6:38 pm
You should! It's a very fun instrument and gives access to a whole type of repertoire where trumpets are not used.

Regarding temperaments, in this recording and for most of the playing I do (i.e. 16th and 17th century music), we use 1/4 meantone. Pitch here is a=466Hz.

Thanks for the information. I was thinking meantone as I listened, but not 100% sure.

I will have to look for a sackbut.

Beautiful!

Max,

This is absolutely exquisite, intimate and endearing.

Fransizka sings as if channeling Sister Rusca herself. Barbora's melodic bass and harmony with your warm baroque trombone sing altogether, of brass and voice and strings, for a journey across nearly four centuries.

I dare say 'if by candlelight in that appropriate wood paneling and tapestry setting - though I read Ego dormio, et cor meum vigilat was thought lost to history in the 1943 Milan fire. So I shall only imagine that in the imagination for the sake of facility safety!

How fortunate to read that a microfilm was discovered later to find Sister Rusca's compositions.

Here you reawaken her spirit as a significant female composer in history.

Bravo and encore,
Dennis

Second video from that session! This time only trombone and theorbo, with an intimate "spiritual madrigal" by Francesca Caccini, who was by all accounts an absolutely fabulous singer (and clearly, also a fabulous composer) of the early 17th century. She is the first woman known to have composed an opera, La Liberazione di Ruggiero, which also appears to have been the first Italian opera performed outside of Italy. This piece is from her sole other surviving publication, Il primo libro delle musiche a una e due voci di Francesca Caccini, printed in Florence in 1618.





Those who have listened to my solo album Scorrete lagrime mie might recognize the piece – it was the second track of the album. Unfortunately, at the time I did not properly check the edition I was using against the original 1618 print, and failed to notice that the edition was actually riddled with errors. I found those errors when preparing my own edition ahead of last summer's ITF. That was a very "newbie" mistake, and quite unforgiveable for an early music specialist.

Fittingly, though, this piece is about penance and atonement.

And the third and final video from that session is out!

This time a piece by Girolamo Frescobaldi preceded by an improvised introduction on theorbo.

LeTromboniste wrote: Wed Feb 11, 2026 1:07 pm And the third and final video from that session is out!

This time a piece by Girolamo Frescobaldi preceded by an improvised introduction on theorbo.

Beautiful!