Concert

Claudio Monteverdi in the Silver Chapel Missa In illo tempore, motets and madrigali spirituali

The Silver Chapel in the Innsbruck Court Church was the venue for the princely private services and devotions of the Tyrolean archdukes, which celebrated the Habsburgs’ commitment to Catholic worship in the spirit of “Pietas Austriaca”. There was also room here for exquisite and innovative musical masterpieces that circulated among connoisseurs, i.e. for “musica reservata”. Claudio Monteverdi’s setting of the Litany of Lauretania seems to have been made for the Silver Chapel. This fundamental liturgical text of the Catholic Counter-Reformation is permanently present through the eponymous silver altar, as the imagery is based on the invocations of supplication to the Virgin Mary. The Lauretanian Litany from a collection published posthumously in 1650 and other treasures from Monteverdi’s sacred music oeuvre, as well as rarely heard madrigali spirituali, create a total work of art in the unique ambience of the Silver Chapel – not least thanks to the use of the world-famous wooden organ. This instrument is probably a legacy from Anna Caterina Gonzaga, the Tyrolean princess and second wife of Archduke Ferdinand II of Austria-Tyrol. She was the sister of Duke Vincenzo I of Mantua, Monteverdi’s employer.

Bonus: 18.15 pre-concert