Goffredo Petrassi was one of the most important Italian composers of the twentieth century. Beginning with the previously unrecorded Divertimento in C, this release focuses on Petrassi’s compositions of the 1930s and 40s. Employing an unusual mix of styles and idioms, as well as brief quotations from Ravel and Stravinsky, the Partita was the first work to win him renown. The eloquent Quattro inni sacri (Four Sacred Hymns), described by the composer as ‘music of today for the faithful of today’, were intended as an antidote ‘to the unctuous and conformist style in use in our churches’ but, in reality, are only ever heard in the concert hall. Soon after the start of the Second World War, Petrassi wrote his meditative madrigale drammatico, Coro di Morti (Chorus of the Dead), the composer’s first setting of a non-sacred text and perhaps his finest achievement in the field of vocal music.