La Spagna

On its first release as a double LP, this legendary 1980 recording was described as ‘a rousing sonic spectacular’ in the US audiophile magazine The Absolute Sound (TAS). Setting off on a sonic journey through Europe, Gregorio Paniagua and his legendary ensemble Atrium Musicæ de Madrid took the famous theme known as La Spagna, used widely by composers across Europe for several centuries, as their point of departure. In their quest to bring to life these old scores, they used a huge range of instruments, from clavicytherium (a ‘vertical harpsichord’) to a simple plastic cup, and the vivid performances and no less vivid recording enchanted both early music fans and audiophiles. An ample selection from the original programme was later made available on CD, but due to technical advances the present disc is the first re-edition of the entire original programme, with Hans Kotter’s Spaniol Kochesberger available to those who play back the disc on an SACD-player. For this Hybrid SACD – playable also on CD players – the recording has been transferred directly from the original analogue master tapes to high resolution DSD format: a leap back in time made possible by the latest technique.