Mirrors, twins, complements, contradictions and echoes abound in ornate profusion in this concert of Baroque tenor duets – the majority of which bathe in the reflected light of the great Monteverdi.

Tenor Emiliano Gonzalez Toro and soprano Mathilde Etienne founded I Gemelli (The Twins) in 2018. Their focus is the vocal music of the 1600s. The voice itself is central; instrumentation and interpretation are treated as its natural outgrowths. It’s like dropping a pebble in a still pool. A pool is a mirror, too (and Etienne in her suitably baroque booklet note alludes to Narcissus); but there is little that is still in this restless, turbulent music for two tenors in which the Swiss Toro is joined by the American tenor Zachary Wilder. 

It is appropriate that while Toro’s voice is slightly darker and fuller, Wilder’s has a lighter quality. They complement each other well. As does the ensemble, with strings (bowed – including sonorous viols – and plucked), winds (cornet, recorder) and keyboards emerging from silence in various configurations according to the requirements of the texts. A kaleidoscope, then, Giordano Bruno’s metaphorical “shattered mirror”...