For centuries mankind has been writing songs about love, about its bliss and about its misfortune. In Western history we know the love song tradition from the famous troubadours to the pop songs of today.

In 16th-century Italy, a genre emerged that was characterized by enormous expressiveness and produced pieces that moved people to tears or led them to heavenly happiness: the madrigal. This genre would become so popular in the course of the 16th and 17th centuries that there would even be almost a hundred different editions of madrigal books in the city of Antwerp alone.

The Flemish composer Adriaan Willaert (from Rumbeke) not only helped to make the madrigal the most important Italian genre of the 16th century, but also laid the foundations of the Venetian school. This produced composers such as Giaches de Wert (Bornem) and Cypriaan de Rore (Ronse), who in turn had an enormous influence on Claudio Monteverdi. All three are known for their madrigals.

In this program, Delle Donne Consort and Paradise Repaired want to shed light on this expressive repertoire that has remained relatively unknown in our region, despite its history. They take the madrigals of love that originated from the Venetian school as their starting point.