Clarinetti all’opera Imep Namur Clarinet Choir, Jean-Luc Votano, Philippe Cuper, Calogero Palermo

• Luigi Bassi (1833 - 1871): Fantasia da Concerto su motivi del « Rigoletto » di Giuseppe Verdi:
• 1 Fantasia da Concerto su motivi del « Rigoletto » di Giuseppe Verdi: Themes & Excerpts (Transcribed by Giuseppe Saggio) 12:57
• Donato Lovreglio (1841 - 1907): Fantasia da Concerto su motivi de « la Traviata » di Giuseppe Verdi:
• 2 Fantasia da Concerto su motivi de « la Traviata » di Giuseppe Verdi: Themes & Excerpts (Transcribed by Giuseppe Saggio) 11:20
• Pietro Mascagni (1863 - 1945): Cavalliera Rusticana:
• 3 Cavalliera Rusticana: Themes & Excerpts (Transcribed by Benjamin Masciotta) 11:25
• I Crisantemi:
• 4 I Crisantemi (Transcribed by Benjamin Masciotta) 05:45
• Amilcare Ponchielli (1834 - 1886): Il Convegno:
• 5 Il Convegno (Transcribed by Roland Cardon) 10:47
• Michele Mangani (b. 1966): Verdiana:
• 6 Verdiana: Fantasia su Temi da opere di Giuseppe Verdi per clarinetto solo e Coro di clarinetti 18:04
• Clarinetti all’Opera:
• 7 Clarinetti all’Opera: Divertimento per tre clarinetti e coro di clarinetti 05:13
• Total Runtime 01:15:31

Info for Clarinetti all’opera

Many opera composers wanted to give the clarinet an importance equal to that of the voice. This album features hits from the Italian romantic opera from, among others, La Traviata, Rigoletto, Cavalleria Rusticana, and adapted for a clarinet choir. If these operas have inspired many adaptations and arrangements, it is to meet the need, once the curtain down, to relive at home the thrills of the operatic scene, when the record did not exist yet. IMEP's Clarinet Choir was founded by Jean-Luc Votano. This clarinetist, established at the age of just 23 at the time of the Cypres recording of Concertos for Clarinet (CYP7609) in 2006, is today also a renowned teacher. Lyrical and festive, the Clarinetti all’Opera programme inaugurates the Cypres_Imep collection, which will be guided by the desire to offer an essential experience to young musicians, in the company of professional soloists, in the conception, recording and dissemination of unique programmes.

Jean-Luc Votano, clarinet
IMEP Namur Clarinet Choir
Philippe Cuper, clarinet
Calogero Palermo, clarinet

Jean-Luc Votano
Born in 1982, Jean-Luc Votano learned to play the clarinet with his father Giovanni Votano when he was 4. He continued his studies at the conservatories of Versailles and Mons. In 2002, at the age of 20, he joined the Orchestre Philharmonique Royal de Liège as first solo clarinet and became a clarinet teacher at the Institut Supérieur de Musique et Pédagogie (IMEP) in Namur. Voted “Best Young Soloist of the Year 2004” by the French-speaking public radio stations and several times nominated for the “Octave de la Musique”, he has won numerous international competitions.

Since the age of seven, he has pursued a second career as a soloist, performing under the direction of prestigious conductors such as Armin Jordan, Louis Langrée, Christian Arming, Yoel Lévy, Yuri Simonov and Pascal Rophé. His passion for chamber music also allows him to practice his art with partners such as Martha Argerich, Michel Dalberto, Nicolas Angelich, François-René Duchâble, Karine Deshayes, Sophie Karthäuser, Jodie Devos, Henri Demarquette, Marie Hallynck, Arnaud Thorette, Boris Belkin, Albrecht-Laurent Breuninger, Geneviève Laurenceau, the quartets Debussy, Danel, Parisii and the Fine Arts Quartet. Since 2007, he his a member of the Abocalips reed trio and in 2010, he joined the Ensemble Contrast.

In 2006, Jean-Luc Votano made his New York debut at the Lincoln Center, while in November 2009, he was invited by the New Japan Philharmonic Orchestra of Tokyo for the Japanese premiere of Magnus Lindberg’s Clarinet Concerto. His repertoire includes about a hundred concertos and chamber music works as well as several major scores from the contemporary repertoire. Composers such as Claude Ledoux, Johan Farjot, Robert Janssens, Max Vandermaesbrugges, Viviane Mataigne and Stéphane Orlando have also dedicated him some of their works.

His discography includes Mozart, Weber and Rossini’s concertos with the Orchestre Philharmonique Royal de Liège conducted by Louis Langrée (Cyprès), the complete works for clarinet and viola by Bruch with Arnaud Thorette, Johan Farjot and Pascal Rophé (Cyprès/Diapason d’or), the complete work for clarinet by Schumann with the Ensemble Contrast (Cyprès), “Mozart Vibration” (Heliotrope) and “Besame Mucho” released in October 2017, with the Ensemble Contrast and the OPRL (Aparté). It will soon be enriched with “Clarinetti all’Opera”, a disc based on Italian opera with the “IMEP Namur Clarinet Choir”, Philippe Cuper and Calogero Palermo.

This album contains no booklet.