ABSTRACT
The fortunes of the Italian chamber cantata on disc mirror, at a general level, those of recordings of the late-Baroque repertory as a whole during the post-war period. A study of the main recordings enables one to identify three fairly well-defined periods in this renaissance spearheaded by recordings, which can be characterized in turn as follows. The period of emergence, where interest in this repertory is sporadic and limited to only a handful of composers, opens with the advent of the long-playing record in the 1950s. Next comes what we may term the period of analysis, beginning in the mid-1970s and thus benefiting from the advances in interpretative knowledge made by specialist ensembles. Towards 1990 we see the first signs of the period of synthesis, which gathers pace in the new millennium. By now, the Italian Baroque cantata has won its natural place in the repertory as a major genre in its own right.
