This programme represents a harvest of rare Italian gems from Baroque to contemporary masters for an instrument that has been of great significance to Italian culture for centuries. Exploration of the guitar’s expressiveness ranges from the lyrical amiability of Brescianello’s Partita No. 7 to Paganini’s delightful miniatures, and the improvisational austerity of Bettinelli’s Cinque preludi. Virtuosity can be found in Malipiero’s only guitar work, the dramatic Preludio, and Giuliani’s extraordinary Rossiniana. Castelnuovo-Tedesco’s meditative Aranci in fiore, was written in gratitude for the gift of a basket of oranges. © Naxos