Month: April 2016

Tenet (Jolle Greenleaf, Molly Quinn & Virginia Warnken Kelsey sopranos, with gamba, harpsichord, theorbo, lute and baroque guitar)
65:08
Avie AV2326

[dropcap]T[/dropcap]here are 18 items here, nos 1, 4, 7, 9, 14 & 16 being instrumental. It is an excellent anthology, mostly from the first half of the 17th century, though the earliest is Diego Ortiz from 1553, the ground bass surviving well into the 17th century. The music is more-or-less equally divided between the voices, and they sound well. Barbara Strozzi is the outstanding composer, with support from Caccini, d’India, Luigi Rossi and Mazzocchi. Do buy it.

However, there are oddities. The normal extra pieces of information that one expects in such anthologies are missing: dates of composers and who sang what. It’s frustrating, particularly since it takes so little space, and it is usual for biographies of composers to be separated from those of performers. But the layout of Italian and English translations work well.

Clifford Bartlett

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[dropcap]T[/dropcap]he New York City-based ensemble perform a programme which professes to revolve around the Concerto delle donne, the trio of female virtuosi who graced the late Renaissance Court of Ferrara. In fact while female composers such as Barbara Strozzi are included, very little of the music here relates directly to the famous trio, and the group’s main composer Luzzascho Luzzaschi is absent completely. The recorded sound is also a bit of an enigma, sounding rather uncomfortably close with a rather synthetic-sounding after-echo, so while the playing and singing is generally pleasant, the overall sound is less than satisfying and a little uncomfortable to listen to for any length of time. This is a pity, as the three singers bring a pleasing spontaneity to tracks such as the anonymous Passacaglia della vita, and the recorded sound seems to cramp their style. The inclusion of a contemporary piece by Caroline Shaw is also a bit of an indulgence – not long enough to establish the more adventurous sound world, but nonetheless a disruption to the Renaissance programme. All in all, I found this CD a bit of a hotch potch, and its idiosyncratic ambience was distinctly off-putting. This is a shame as the performances seem quite good and yet the captured sound is disappointing and the programme a bit unfocused.

D. James Ross

Joanne Lunn, Carolyn Sampson, Robin Blaze, Gerd Türk, Dominik Wörner SSATB, Bach Collegium Japan chorus & orchestra, Masaaki Suzuki
78:55
BIS-2181 SACD
+ Tilge Höchster meine Sünden BWV1083 (after Pergolesi), Schlage doch gewünschte Stunde BWV53 (Hofmann?)

[dropcap]T[/dropcap]he chief work in Vol. 6 of Bach’s Secular Cantatas by Suzuki’s forces is Cantata 198, the Trauerode, given a poised and colourful performance, where only the string band seems a little below par. The vocal contributions are bright and focused in the choruses as well as in the solo arias, and none of Suzuki’s regulars disappoints. Perhaps we are so used to hearing Peter Kooij that only Dominik Wörner doesn’t seem to me quite such a natural interpreter of this extraordinary music.

The Trauerode  was a private commission by a young, aristocratic and presumably wealthy student to commemorate the death of Christine Ebehardine, the wife of Augustus, the Elector of Saxony and King of Poland in a secular memorial event in Leipzig two months after her death, on 17th October 1727. She was revered all over Saxony for not having followed her husband in converting to Catholicism, which he did in order to gain the crown of Poland. The university tried to intervene, and hijack the commission for their man, Görner, but Bach’s rich and inventive score triumphed. It is unusual for having not only pairs of flutes and oboes d’amore, but also of violas da gamba and lutes. The concerto-like first movement displays these different groups within the score, the fourth (an alto recitativo) displays the flutes imitating the funeral bells supported by the wiry strumming of the lutes below and, after a wonderful aria for alto with an obbligato pair of violas da gamba, the choral fugue that is the seventh movement has an instrumental episode reminiscent of a trio section in the Presto of the Fourth Brandenburg in the middle. The aria for tenor that followed the oration is especially interesting as it gives us an idea (in the written-out ‘improvised’ part for gambas and lutes) of how Bach might have elaborated his continuo parts. In the recitative that follows the lutenists show how they improvise a free part to enrich the short organ and ’cello chords, and I find it both instructive and convincing in heightening the rather operatic nature of the recit. This a gracious and engaging performance.

The other pieces on this CD are rather loosely connected: first there is a fine performance by Robin Blaze of the single aria movement Schlage doch, once named as BWV53, but now believed to be by Georg Melchior Hoffmann, with its strings and campanelli; and second, the arrangement by Bach in 1746/7 of Pergolesi’s Stabat Mater  to words of the penitential Psalm 51, Tilge, Höchster, meine Sünden  (BWV 1083), which is not really a cantata at all.

This performance was recorded in 2005, so predates the other recordings by ten years. The soprano then was Carolyn Sampson, singing with a younger Robin Blaze. And the very Italianate music by the young Pergolesi, who died in 1736 at the age of 26, sounds an odd accompaniment to the Lutheran Miserere, especially the jaunty and operatic verse 4. The contrapuntal verse 9 fares better in Bach’s hands, and this and the concluding Amen are the only two sections that required no modifications to fit them to the new words. In the interests of completeness in Suzuki’s great project, it is good to have this piece available. But there is no history of a liturgical context for the arrangement or surviving commission.

The string parts are elegantly phrased, and, as far as I can judge, the performance is all that we might wish for vocally as well. But it is a very odd piece without any known context – unlike some of Bach’s adaptations of certain other Italianate mass movements – to make sense of an arrangement in a style so foreign to his.

David Stancliffe

Neumeyer Consort, Felix Koch
92:06 (2 CDs in a wallet)
Christophorus CHR77400

[dropcap]B[/dropcap]esides being a professional baroque orchestra (or part of being one in the 21st century?), The Neumeyer Consort is involved in a number of educational initiatives, one of which is offering students the chance to join such an ensemble while still studying. Their take on the Brandenburgs is directed by the cellist, Felix Koch (though he is only listed as playing in the sixth concerto). The playing is very good, and there are nice moments of spontaneous ornamentation. As always, I am puzzled by the fact that the gap in the third concerto is filled by the harpsichordist, and with a not entirely convincing segue into the “Phrygian half-cadence”, either. The booklet note re-visits the possibly links between these six concertos with mythology – not that it really matters, but I remain unconvinced.

Brian Clark

La Compagnia del Madrigale
68:34
Glossa GCD922805

[dropcap]T[/dropcap]his is a fascinating and sometimes thrilling recital of spiritual contrafacta  (published in 1607 and 1609), combined with the four madrigalian motets published by Bianchi in 1620. The re-texted madrigals are mainly from Book 5 (1605). Two short organ toccatas by Frescobaldi (wrong generation?) provide contrasting punctuation.

These are brilliant performers, both as individuals and collectively but I did sometimes feel that this very virtuosity tempts them into detailed nuances of micro-managed declamation – syllables, rather than words or longer musical lines – which do not always serve the repertoire to the best effect. It’s that old musica/parole  debate again. Get it, and join in. You definitely won’t find the performances dull.

David Hansell

Cappella Neapolitana, Antonio Florio
56:04
Glossa GCD922609

[dropcap]T[/dropcap]his is rather good – both work and performance. Stylistically think A. Scarlatti but with a bit more dynamism. The bulk of the narrative is carried by the falsettist Evangelist (original part in C1) extremely well after the very first consonant (which delays the focussing of both the succeeding vowel and its pitch). The other soloists have much less to do but the standard does not drop and the chorus are also on the ball for their brief interjections. In the booklet the essay (Eng/Fr/Ger/It) is informative bar one embarrassing mis-translation (p7, line 8 ‘sixteenth’ should be seventeenth), though the Latin libretto is translated into English only. Strongly recommended, especially for seasonal listening.

David Hansell

Chantal Santon-Jeffrey & Daniela Skorka dessus, Mathias Vidal & Jeffrey Thompson haute-contre, Alain Buet basse-taille, Purcell Choir, Orfeo Orchestra, Győrgy Vashegyi
96:07 (2 CDs in a wallet)
Glossa GCD 923508
Cantate Domino, De Profundis, Magnus Dominus, Nisi Dominus

[dropcap]M[/dropcap]ondonville’s grands motet s are just wonderful – core repertoire at the Concert Spirituel  in his day and steadily gaining ground in ours. Cantate Domino  is here recorded for the first time. It begins with a well-crafted chorus of which Handel would have been proud and continues with a duet and a series of solo récits before a fine sequence of ensembles and choruses conclude matters. These performers have a strong record in French Baroque repertoire and maintain their standard here. The chorus is a little larger and therefore less focussed than would have been ideal but almost everything else is as good as one might hope for. I just long for the day when lady soloists don’t feel they have to try so hard.

David Hansell