With this album, we enter the court of the Swedish Queen Christina (1626-1689), who distinguished herself through her artistic and scientific passions, but also through her immensely lavish courtly lifestyle. A few years before her spectacular abdication and return to Catholicism (1654), she had engaged an Italian opera company, including the Roman singer Domenico Albrici and his then 21-year-old son Vincenzo. The latter had already made a career at home and within a few years had created a series of excellent vocal works in Sweden, which, together with some instrumental pieces, became part of the famous Düben collection at Uppsala University. From around three dozen titles, Manfred Cordes has compiled one of those beautiful, melodious anthologies that have become the unmistakable trademark of the Weser Renaissance.