L'arte del mondo

German orchestra L'Arte del Mondo directs its energies chiefly toward period-informed interpretations, with particular emphasis on reviving rarely heard pieces and devising fresh approaches to established repertoire that yield unexpected angles. Along those lines the ensemble has extended its reach to works dating as late as the Romantic period.

Freelance German conductor Werner Ehrhardt launched the group in 2004. It soon earned engagements at leading German festivals, among them the Beethoven Festival in Bonn. A 2006 recording of Etienne Méhul's L'Irato ou L'Emporté earned the French Diapason d'Or prize. The orchestra joined the Capriccio roster and issued its debut release for the label, Giovanni Paisiello's little-known Passio di San Giovanni, the following year. Subsequent projects appeared on Capriccio, Onyx, and Deutsche Harmonia Mundi, the last of these issuing a 2016 performance of Antonio Salieri's La Scuola de' Gelosi. That same year the ensemble undertook its first tours of both North and South America. It has also documented a set of symphonies by Carl Stamitz for CPO.

Experimental presentations account for much of L'Arte del Mondo's visibility. The orchestra took part in composer Max Richter's Vivaldi Recomposed treatment of the Four Seasons violin concertos and joined Turkey's Pera Ensemble for a reimagining of Mozart's The Abduction from the Seraglio that adopted a Turkish vantage point. Additional partnerships have involved musicians from Israel and Palestine as well as performers from the Beijing Opera. In 2011 the group received a second Diapason d'Or for its accompaniment of Israeli soprano Chen Reiss in a program of pieces by Mozart, Haydn, and Salieri.

Since the 2010-2011 season L'Arte del Mondo has held permanent residency at the Bayer Kulturhaus in Leverkusen, Germany. Beyond Reiss, the orchestra has presented sopranos Simone Kermes, Edita Gruberová, Laura Aikins, and Raffaella Milanesi; tenors Christoph Prégardien, Rainer Trost, and Thomas Michael Allen; violinists Daniel Hope, Viktoria Mullova, and Baiba Skride; trumpeter Reinhold Friedrich; harpist Xavier de Maistre; and jazz pianist Uri Caine.