Vivaldi: Credo, RV 591

Description

The Credo belongs to that large group of church works which Vivaldi composed in Venice between 1713 and 1717 for the Ospedale della Pietà, then his primary place of employment. The composition, conceived solely for choir and strings, is characterized by a two-layered formal design: a continuous, basic motivic idea, i.e., a constant rhythmic impulse with rapid tone repetition builds an instrumental layer, while on the other hand the writing for choir renders the text in a blocklike structure in chordal declamation. This structure will only be abandoned briefly in the concluding section of work, where the text "Et vitam venturi saeculi" is embedded in a concise fugue.