Esperar, Sentir, Morir: Songs and Dances from the Hispanic Baroque

"Sensuous entertainment from 17th-century Spain fills this exquisite CD from the group Charivari Agréable, an oxymoron meaning pleasant racket. Most of this agreeable din is in easy, lilting three-time ‹ courtly love dances with the faint exotic whiff of Moorish Arabia. The music sighs with baroque affectation in hope or anguish for secular or sacred love.

Two singers lead the gentle instruments. Clara Sanabras has a most seductive voice, especially in the goldfinch song Gilguerillo, on which she soothes and caresses in pure falling phrases. Rodrigo del Pozo, meanwhile, has a soft poetic grace that pleads with appealing persistence on Hidalgo's Porque Mas. And there is even Pachelbel's famous bassline, dressed to kill. The singers perform a duet in charming lovers' thirds on Escalada's Canten, which sits alongside the comic dialogue of Barter¹s Hazo Anton, the light relief amid the steamy moments. Even the technicians join in with flamenco clapping on the final track, so sure are they of a triumph."
(The Times)

"This is delightful music, well performed, and the disc comes well-recommended."
(MusicWeb)

"Like buccaneers of old, scholars are now in the process of raiding the Spanish Main and returning loaded with musical treasure. Latin-American music of the baroque era is essentially European in style but enriched with indigenous colours and infectious rhythms…the process is revelatory, as is the musical outcome."
Five Stars ***** BBC Music Mag (January 2006)