Draw on, sweet night
Weep, O mine eyes
Adieu, sweet Amaryllis
Sweet honey-sucking bees/Yet, sweet, take heed
Thou art but young
Cruel, behold my heavy ending
I live, and yet methinks/There is a jewel
I love, alas! yet am not loved
Oft have I vowed
Down in a valley/Hard destinies
When shall my wretched life
O what shall I do?
Love not me for comely grace
Happy, O happy he
There where I saw
Lady, your words do spite me
O wretched man
Ye restless thoughts
Lady, when I behold
Thus saith my Cloris bright
Weep, weep, mine eyes
Flora gave me fairest flowers
All pleasure is of this condition
Of joys and pleasing pains/My throat is sore
Where most my thoughts/Despiteful thus

welcome the spring, British ensemble I Fagiolini puts aside its beloved Monteverdi to uncover its own national heritage: the best of John Wilbye's classic Golden Age madrigals.

Whilst his oeuvre may have been small (just 75 works that we know of and most just a couple of minutes long), time and again, in these exquisite cameos, Wilbye delivers what might be reckoned the ultimate madrigal experience. The plangent dissonance of ‘Draw on, sweet night’ and ‘Weep, weep, mine eyes’ perfectly evoke English melancholy, while ‘Sweet honey-sucking bees’ and ‘Adieu, sweet Amaryllis’ are such sheer pleasure to sing that many listeners will scrabble to unearth old scores. This album is, in a nutshell, 75 minutes of madrigalian bliss!

Rediscover or enjoy anew this central part of English choral culture, strangely out of fashion for so long, sung by a group that has matured into the repertoire like a good wine.

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Recorded at Specific Sound Studios, London, 28-29 August 2014 (Tr. 1, 6, 9, 11, 13, 14); Wathen Hall, St Paul’s School, Barnes, London, 21-23 August 2021.