Category: Recording

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Recording

Byrd 1588

CD cover Byrd 1588 Alamire Fretwork David Skinner

Psalmes, Sonets & songs of sadnes and pietie
Grace Davidson soprano, Martha McLorinan mezzo-soprano, Nicholas Todd tenor, Alamire, Fretwork, David Skinner
157:14 (2 CDs in a single jewel case)
Inventa INV1006

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It is a pleasure to report that everything about this double album is excellent. The music, the concept, the soloists, the ensembles and the recording quality are all outstanding. Byrd simply does not “do” duff, and some of these works are masterpieces even by his standards. The album consists of the whole of Byrd’s first collection of songs, published to provide accurate versions to counter those that had begun to circulate in copies unsatisfactory to the composer. Many were initially composed for a single voice with an accompaniment for four instruments: unspecified, but contemporary evidence confirms viols. Here they are all arranged for five voices, though single parts in several of the songs are labelled “the first singing part”. There are also a number of these songs which survive in their original versions for a soloist with four viols (also arrangements for lute, for which Byrd never composed) in contemporary manuscripts. Just one piece, La verginella, lacks the label for a first singing part in the print but survives as an accompanied solo song in manuscript. There is also a phrase in Byrd’s introduction which can be interpreted as allowing for performances of the songs solely by instruments. Of the 35 songs, fourteen are sung by Alamire, seventeen are sung by one of the soloists accompanied by Fretwork, and four are played by Fretwork alone.

Eight of the songs are new to disc: Although the heathen poets, As I beheld I saw a herdman wild, Even from the depth, Help Lord for wasted are those men, If that a sinner’s sighs, Mine eyes with fervency of sprite, O Lord who in thy sacred tent and Where fancy fond. (Even I had never before heard If that a sinner’s sighs which is one of the four allotted here to Fretwork alone.) It is astonishing that these had not previously received commercial recordings, all being up to Byrd’s usual standard. This neglect can partly be explained by a preoccupation with a handful of other pieces from the collection, notably Lullaby (35 recordings currently available), Though Amaryllis dance in green (sixteen) and Come to me grief for ever (thirteen), plus others in high single figures. Tempting as it is to comment on all these hitherto unrecorded pieces individually and in detail, suffice it to mention a few. Even from the depth is a sonorous psalm well worthy of starting the second disc complementing O God give ear with which the album begins. Two others are perhaps the strangest items in the collection. Although the heathen poets lasts barely a minute and is anyway made of one phrase repeated. That said, it makes an impression which is out of all proportion to its brevity. Provoking even more thought is As I beheld I saw a herdman wild which, while certainly describing a destructive act of amorous despair, sounds almost hallucinatory, as Byrd gets inside the mind of the distraught rustic. Typically of the greatest composers and writers, Byrd creates a profoundly democratic work, crediting an ostensibly primitive person with profound feelings without in any way patronising, demeaning or deriding him.

Several of the songs already recorded exist in versions alternative to those selected by David Skinner, rendering Alamire’s renditions all the more welcome for comparison and variety. This is best illustrated by what is arguably the greatest song in the collection, the concluding lament for Sir Philip Sidney O that most rare breast sung here with controlled intensity by the mezzo Martha McLorinan. There are, or have been, four other recordings of this masterpiece (and should be at least four times that number). One is sung by five voices, the others by a soloist with viols etc. My “etc.” is loaded, because, well though Robin Blaze sings on his version, as a matter of personal taste and preference I cannot abide the distracting presence of Erica Clapton, aka the estimable Elizabeth Kenny and her lute plucking alongside the viols in the accompaniment. Emma Kirkby gives as fine a performance as one would expect, with Fretwork, on William Byrd: Consort Songs (Harmonia Mundi HMU 907 383). Even outshining these two distinguished ladies is the soprano Annabella Tysall with the Rose Consort of Viols on the – for now – frustratingly unavailable Ah, Dear Heart … Songs, Dances and Laments from the Age of Elizabeth I (Woodmansterne 002-2). She manages to impart the sombre text radiantly, while the accompaniment is crystal clear in every detail, each note being so important in any work by Byrd. Finally, among the solo versions, possibly even capping this wonderful recording, is the version by the countertenor John York Skinner on a disc of selections from this very collection, performed by The Consort of Musicke under Anthony Rooley (Decca 4750492). It is a cliché to refer to the otherworldliness of this voice, but not all stereotypes are always wrong, and this quality, besides Skinner’s engagement with the words, his accuracy in tuning, the steady tread as of a funeral march, and the immaculately clear accompaniment of the Consort’s viols, make this a claimant to be the finest recording of this exceptional piece. But … we are not finished yet: there is the version by five singers which I mentioned. This is by the Trinity Consort led by Clare Wilkinson (Beulah 1RF2) and in every way it complements the Decca recording which I have just mentioned, the pacing, tuning and interpretation immaculate and profoundly moving. All of Byrd’s songs, and this one, in particular, deserve nothing less.

So this present recording is a triumph. The music itself is from the top drawer. Do not be surprised if, after you will have listened to it a couple of times, you wake up of a morning and find any one of several songs running through your head. “Catchy” might not be a word that instantly springs to mind apropos of Byrd, but it is part of the success of many of these songs, and I am not sure that the old fellow would have minded the word too much. Of the more cerebral songs, the metrically sophisticated The match that’s made is memorably performed by five voices which, besides being executed superbly, is a great relief after the fussy hybrid version on the disc of 1588 selections mentioned above. On this complete recording, there are simply no duff tracks, and there is something for everybody, for every mood. The three soloists acquit themselves admirably. If I have a criticism it is that occasionally Fretwork’s inner parts are too modest or understated: the consecutive sixth with the voice in the final cadence of O that most rare breast is almost inaudible, likewise Byrd’s crucial consecutive thirds under the soloist’s first “heavy” and a few spicey passing notes in other pieces. Also, the two verses accompanied pizzicato sound twee. That said, I have never heard the dissonances delivered so deliciously in the conclusions to the burden of Lullaby and at the first “if such on Earth were found” towards the end of Why do I use my paper, ink and pen, while the accompaniments to Who likes to love and most especially the premiere Where fancy fond are bracing, buoyant and effervescent. Indeed, the latter, sung enchantingly by Grace Davidson, epitomises the excellence of this double album, a discographical benchmark.

Richard Turbet

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Recording

Avondano: Il mondo della luna

Avondano Il mondo nella luna

Fernando Guimarães tenor, Luis Rodrigues bass, Susana Gaspar soprano, et al
Os Músicos do Tejo directed by Marcos Magalhães
137:17 (2 CDs)
Naxos 8.660487-88

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During the first half of the 18th century, opera in Portugal pursued a somewhat fitful course, a mixture of local genres such as zarzuela and the Italian opera that swept Europe during the latter half of the previous century. Only after 1750, with the accession of the opera-mad King José I, was there a truly flourishing operatic scene in Portugal, though that was severely disrupted by the Lisbon earthquake of 1755, which destroyed the recently built Casa da Ópera just months after its inauguration.

Pedro António Avondano’s Il mondo della luna was given its first performance at another royal theatre, Salvaterra de Magos in 1765. Avondano was the son of an Italian violinist who had found employment in the lavishly appointed royal chapel of Jose I’s immediate predecessor, João V. He followed in his father’s footsteps, serving in the chapel between 1754 and 1782, writing both secular and sacred music. Il mondo della luna, based on a libretto by Carlo Goldoni first set by Galuppi in 1750 and subsequently by a number of composers including Haydn (1777), is his only opera. A three-act comic opera, it follows the usual format for a Goldoni opera of including a number of duets and, crucially, the act finales with continuous musical and often hectic dramatic development that the Venetian writer played such a large role in establishing as an essential component of opera buffa. All are employed in Il mondo, the plot of which concerns the efforts of the suitors of Clarice and Flaminia, the daughters of Buona Fede, a rich, but naïve old man, to fool him into believing he has been transported to the moon, where he has been duped into believing that women live according to the strict moral code he would impose on his daughters. Delighted with the lunar world, Buona Fede then has to watch the farrago that has been planned for him unfold, ultimately leaving him little option but to accede to the marriage of both girls and his shrewish maid, Lisetta, who he had hoped to marry himself.

Avondano’s music reveals him to be not only thoroughly conversant with buffa style, but melodically gifted and capable of orchestral writing that makes extensive use of the wind band. Arias are mostly brief and while few are memorable, there are several in the sentimental style that leave an impression, Clarice’s act 2 ‘Quanta gente che sospiri’ being perhaps the stand-out example, while his handling of the act finales is assured.

The present recording stems from performances given in the Teatro Thalia in Lisbon and omits some scenes and arias. It is curious, indeed unique in my experience, that while recitatives were recorded in live performance, the musical numbers were not, though there is little difference in acoustic. More fascinating is the experimental manner in which the recitatives were prepared, the cast learning the text but fitting it to music only after hearing the accompaniment in rehearsal. It certainly works in part, for the recits have an immediacy and lively point that is not always the case. Against that there are places where it feels over-played, in particular the silly voices adopted for what is presumably intended as ‘moon-speak’, which soon becomes irritating on record, particularly when no text or translation is available with the set.

The performance is dominated by the splendidly rounded bass of Luis Rodrigues’s Buona Fede, who also turns in a master class in vocal acting, relishing the foolish old man’s gullible antics. There is also some fine singing from the principal young couple, Ecclitico (Fernando Guimarães) and Clarice (Susana Gaspar) and another excellent bass, João Fernandes as the servant Cecco. The period-instrument orchestral playing is decent, if not of outstanding quality and the whole idiomatically directed with considerable verve by Marcos Magalhães. If a certain provincial air hangs over the project, that is more than outweighed by its infectious exuberance, a case of the heart being very much in the right place.

Brian Robins

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Music for the King of Scots

Inside the Pleasure Palace of James IV
The Binchois Consort, Andrew Kirkman (conductor)
55:17
CDA68333

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This disc consists of the anonymous “Catherine Wheel Mass”, a modern nickname for the Missa Horrenda subdenda rotarum machinamento (previously known as Missa Deus creator omnium) and a Magnificat, also anonymous, both from the Scottish Carver Choirbook, plus Cornysh’s Ave Maria, mater Dei from the later English Eton Choirbook, prefaced by two chants, “Horrendo subdenda” itself and “Dilexisti iustitiam”. As such it is a logical successor to the Consort’s preceding release Music for St Katherine of Alexandria (Hyperion CDA68274), which I reviewed in EMR posted 31 May 2019. A seemingly huge amount of technological, architectural and scientific preparation has gone into the making of this recording, in order to give the listener an experience as close as possible to what it is thought would have been the case in the Chapel Royal at Linlithgow Palace during the 1490s, in the reign of the doomed James IV, killed by the English on Flodden Field in 1513. The project is described in detail in the accompanying booklet.

Now for the small matter of the music. During the week before the arrival of this record, I had the joy of listening to the masses and Lamentations of Alonso Lobo. The Catherine Wheel Mass is of course much earlier and is as audibly mediaeval as Lobo is audibly Renaissance. During a ruminative passage such as the opening of the Sanctus or the conclusion of the Hosanna to the Benedictus with its brief but effective moment of three against two, the Mass can sound as intense as Lobo, but some of its other music sounds clinical and mathematical. Lobo’s consistently ardent works include many passages which are intricately canonical and could also be called mathematical but in comparison, the Catherine Wheel Mass can at times sound like music which could be attractive perhaps more to musicologists, theorists and performers than to rank and file listeners. That said, there are also the likes of two stunning passages near the beginning of the Agnus: a wonderful sequence in two parts around 0’40” and the fabulously warm entry of all four parts around 0’50”. But Ockeghem it is not.

Nor is it Carver. As a member of the Carver Choir of Aberdeen throughout its existence, which included commercial recordings of two of the great man’s masses, I was bitterly disappointed to see that none of his music is included, given the presence of two works from his eponymous Choirbook. At only 55 minutes of music, there was scope for more, and the reason given for the inclusion of Cornysh’s famous motet seems like special pleading when perhaps one motive was to include a well-kent work to partner the premiere of the mass. There is nothing wrong with the recording by Cappella Nova (Gaudeamus GAU 124/6/7) of the complete surviving works of Robert Carver (1487-1565) – still the finest of Scottish composers with all due respects (and there are many of them) to Sir James MacMillan – but such is the quality of Carver’s music that there is room for more interpretations by different sorts of ensembles: for instance, it would be exhilarating to hear the Choir of St Mary’s Episcopal Cathedral, Edinburgh, tackle his Missa Fera pessima a5, not to mention the ten-part Missa Dum sacrum mysterium quoted by Sir James in his excellent fourth symphony (Hyperion CDA68317). Obviously, an ensemble such as the Binchois Consort with seven members was not going to perform O bone Iesu with its nineteen parts, but Carver’s other surviving motet Gaude flore virginali a5 could have replaced Cornysh, which receives a wiry, almost muscular performance with some quirky musica ficta, or better still it could have been added.

The Magnificat is probably English, or it could have been influenced by contemporary English style. There are two such works for four voices in the Carver Choirbook. (The other has been recorded by The Sixteen on their fine disc of Carver’s ten-part mass and O bone Iesu both mentioned above, Coro COR16051). It is an alternatim setting with the chant “harmonised” a4 according to the contemporary Scottish “fourth kind of fabourdoun”; these sections sound enjoyably like mediaeval barbershop … though of superior quality.

Scientifically this is a remarkable project and music has been chosen that is appropriate to it. The singing is technically as good as it could be. Just when the performances seem to be becoming slick, as in some frenetic sections of the Credo, this tendency is trumped by sensitive passages such as the “Dona nobis pacem” concluding the Agnus, besides others in the Credo, plus those also in the Agnus and in the Sanctus, already mentioned. Unlike the unerringly high standard of performance, the quality of the music is uneven, seeming to vary between routine note-spinning and breath-taking inspiration. “The pleasure palace of James IV” sounds somewhat tacky, but the project is driven by an admirable aspiration, at odds with this subtitle, to enable us to hear the music in the way that the monarch would have done. It is a fascinating glimpse of sacred music in Scotland between the famous Scottish Lady Mass c. 1230 (Red Byrd, Hyperion CDA67299) and the phenomenon that was, and is, Robert Carver. As such it is a project well worth investigating.

Richard Turbet

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Recording

Lamento

CD cover of Lamento Damien Guillon Cafe Zimmermann

Damien Guillon countertenor, Café Zimmermann
69:06
Alpha Classics Alpha 626
Music by J. C. & J. M. Bach, Bernhard, Biber, Froberger & Schmelzer

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Few chamber ensembles play the music of Baroque Germany with more authority than Café Zimmermann, and in their latest release they have unearthed some superb music associated with death and mortality – little can they have realised as they recorded the programme in May 2019 how relevant it would have become by the time of its release. The most remarkable aspect of the project is the discovery of so much unfamiliar music of superlative quality, in some cases by composers who are also virtually unknown. Principal amongst these are the two ‘regional’ Bachs, Johann Michael (1648-1694) organist at Gehren, and Johann Christoph (1642-1703), organist at Eisenach. The former is represented by an eloquent strophic aria and the latter by a powerfully expressive lament, both sung expressively by Damien Guillon, who also graces the setting of Psalm 42 by Schütz pupil Christoph Bernhard, as well as a quite mesmerising setting of O dulcis Jesu, attributed to Heinrich Biber. While, as Peter Wollny’s programme note points out, the writing for the obbligato violin in this striking piece is thoroughly Biberesque in style, the vocal writing bears no resemblance to any of Biber’s surviving oeuvre that I know of, and indeed I would be cautious of the attribution of this anonymous piece. And if we are tempted to think cynically of the relationship between Baroque patrons and composers, Schmelzer’s deeply heartfelt “Lamento sopra la morte Ferdinandi III” provides a useful antidote. This is a CD packed with unanticipated melancholy delights, and Café Zimmermann, with their ideal blend of authority and genuine lively curiosity, are the perfect ensemble in whose company to explore it. Perhaps the bravest decision of many is to conclude the disc with Biber’s extraordinary unaccompanied Passacaglia from the Rosenkranzsonaten for solo violin – it is a testimony to the superb technique and musicality of the group’s first violinist, Pablo Valetti, that we are riveted to the last!

D. James Ross

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La revolta de les Germanies

CD cover of Revolta de les germanies Carles Magraner

Revolt of the Brotherhoods: War and peace in the Renaissance
Capella de Ministrers, Carles Magraner
76:47
CdM 2049

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This CD,  marking the 500th anniversary of the uprising of the Guilds in Valencia (the ‘Germanies’ of the title), the Spanish equivalent of the roughly contemporary Peasants’ Revolt in Germany, proves to be a celebration of battle music from the Renaissance. All the old warhorses are here – Isaac’s Alla Battaglia, Susato’s Battle Pavane, the Gervaise Pavanne and Galliarde de la Guerre, Andrea Gabrieli’s Aria della Battaglia (for which the programme note erroneously claims a period instrument premiere performance!) and Hassler’s Battle Intrada and Gagliarda. The rather cavernous acoustic of the church of Sant Miquel dels Reis in Valencia proves problematic for this repertoire. The rather dominant drumming has a tendency to ‘jam’ the other wavelengths, and in tandem with some rather ‘coy’ playing of the wind instruments, the impact of this martial music is dissipated – surely it is clear that this secular battle music for instruments just wouldn’t have been performed in this kind of bathroom acoustic! Things don’t really improve, however, with the addition of the singers, who seem to inhabit an artificial space both too close to the microphones and simultaneously swimming in the larger acoustic. These recording idiosyncrasies cannot be ignored, and this is a great shame, as the repertoire and performances seem generally good, expressive and idiomatic, and the copious supporting notes are fascinating and comprehensive. Some listeners will take exception to the over-busy percussion, including deep drums, cymbals and some sort of tubular bells, but I have to say I found the acoustic more troubling. I would love to have heard these performances by what are clearly fine musicians of intriguing repertoire in a more stable and clear acoustic, where I could have enjoyed their musicianship more thoroughly.

D. James Ross

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Mascitti·Fornaci·Fenaroli: Arie e Sonate

Arie e sonate Mascitti Labirinto Armonico

Labirinto Armonico
56:06
Tactus TC 660004

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My response to this imaginatively programmed CD is largely dictated by my reaction to the voice of the group’s mezzo-soprano, Elisabetta Pallucchi. We spend about a quarter of the disc in her hands, as she sings the six dramatic arias by Giacomo Fornaci, and sadly I found her constant broad vibrato very much at odds with the music and indeed with the tonal purity of the instrumentalists. This is a pity, particularly as it is clear that she could sing without vibrato if she wanted, but allows it to flourish on any sustained note she sings. Quite why it didn’t strike anybody as odd, that the instruments were using one approach and she another, is puzzling. Fornaci’s Amorosi Respiri Musicali of 1617 sound interesting, but I was unable to enjoy them to the full. The unifying factor in this enterprising programme is geographical – all three composers are natives of Abruzzo (not the ‘Abruzzi’ of the programme note), the region of Italy east of Rome with an Adriatic coast. Born in 1598, Fornaci is the oldest composer represented. Next comes Michele Mascitti (1664-1760), represented by probably the best of the music, the last three of an opus 4 set of 12 Sonate for two violins and continuo, tastefully rendered by the ensemble. Last but not least is Fidele Finaroli (1730-1818), whose six organ sonatas are imaginatively presented by Maurizio Maffezzoli on the Sebastiano Vici organ of 1790 in the Chiesa di S. Lorenzo Martire in Mergo, an instrument illustrated and fully described in the programme booklet. Maffezzoli finds some intriguing registrations to bring this music vividly to life – significantly one stop that he uses features a wide vibrato as if to pre-empt my criticism of the group’s vocalist! Sadly, what suits 19th-century organ music, doesn’t suit early 17th-century vocal music.

D. James Ross

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Handel: Brockes Passion

CD cover Handel Brockes Passion Cohen Alpha Classics


Sandrine Piau Tochter Sion, Stuart Jackson Evangelist, Konstantin Krimmel Jesus, Arcangelo, Jonathan Cohen
160:46 (2 CDs in a card triptych)
Alpha Classiques Alpha 644

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The Hamburg poet Barthold Heinrich Brockes’s passion oratorio Der für die Sünde der Welt gemarterte und sterbende Jesus, more conveniently known as Brockes-Passion, was first published in 1712. Possibly written for Reinhold Keiser, who set the text for Easter that year, in succeeding years it was taken up by some of the most notable German composers of the day, including Telemann (1716), Mattheson (1718), Fasch (date unknown) and Stölzel (1725). Handel’s setting, of which the autograph is lost, is strikingly lacking documentation, neither the date nor purpose of its composition being known. It is usually tentatively assigned to c1716, a year in which Handel made a return visit to his native country, but the first record of it being performed comes only three years later when it was given in Hamburg in the spring of 1719, on 3 April according to David Vickers’s notes, but 23 March according to Christopher Hogwood’s monograph on Handel.

Brockes’s text is a free paraphrase on Jesus’s passion drawn from the gospels but, as its full title suggests, infused with strong Pietist sentiment. It has three principal solo roles: soprano (Daughter of Zion), tenor (Evangelist) and bass (Jesus), in addition to which there are smaller parts for an allegorical Faithful Soul, Peter, Pilate and other figures familiar from the dramatic events. In keeping with more familiar gospel settings, the narrative is carried forward by recitative, with arias that complement the drama or comment on it. Mostly brief and syllabic – there is relatively little bravura writing – these arias are generally either through-composed or strophic in the German manner, but a number adopt Italianate da capo form. A surprising aspect is the comparatively small role given to the chorus, restricted largely to its role in the drama or an occasional chorale. Most modern commentators have tended to be less than complimentary about Brockes’s text. Indeed some of the more lurid or fanciful verse holds little appeal today, such passages as the recitative castigating the crown of thorns for its cruelty – ‘Foolhardy thorns, barbaric spikes! Wild murderous thicket, desist!’ – more likely to raise a smile than empathy. But it is of its day; more curious are dramatic weaknesses that depart from the narrative for substantial stretches to comment and observe, the long sequence of aria-recit-aria-recit-aria, for the Daughter of Zion that includes the words just quoted not advancing the story in any sense. Then there is the mystery of the missing Jesus, who having played a full role in the first half disappears entirely in the second with the exception of a pair of brief duets, the first with the Daughter, the second with his mother Mary, the poignant final words from the cross assigned to the Evangelist. 

Although it – needless to say – includes some splendid music, this strange, dramatically weak book did not inspire Handel to the full extent of his powers, although he did find sufficient in it to reuse a substantial amount of music in the later oratorios Esther and Deborah. But it is probably best summed up by Handel expert Winton Dean in his seminal study on the dramatic oratorios: ‘In the Brockes-Passion Handel comes nearest to challenging Bach, and retires discomforted’.

Arcangelo’s performance is a mixed blessing. On the credit side is the scale of the performance, with a small orchestra and vocal ensemble of two voices per part. That is much what we might have expected to find in a Hamburg performance in 1719. There is also the intrinsic quality of the singing and playing, both of which are outstanding. Give or take the usual caveats about some unconvincing ornamentation (or lack of it altogether; you’ll hear one vocal trill throughout the performance), the three main soloists are splendid. The beautifully sustained lines of Sandrine Piau’s cantabile in the more reflective arias gives special pleasure, while the rich nobility of Konstantin Krimmel’s Jesus is scarcely less memorable. The vocal ensemble, from which the well-delineated smaller roles are drawn, includes such notable names as sopranos Mhairi Lawson and Mary Bevan and is also excellent in the choruses.

Sadly such quality is compromised by a number of questionable directorial decisions, not least the excessively slow and at times mannered tempos adopted for far too many arias and, arguably worse still, recitative, which at times drags unconscionably, thus rendering Stuart Jackson’s fine Evangelist less imposing and authoritative than it would otherwise have been. Jonathan Cohen’s inexplicable and almost certainly ahistorical decision to employ two (!) lutes in his continuo was a major error that recalls the memorable words of EMR’s late founder – ‘silly pluckers!’ Here their arpeggiating, twiddling contribution is irritating at best and vulgarly intrusive at worst, as in Jesus’s intensely moving accompaganto, ‘Das ist mein Blut. Such scars regrettably prevent me from giving the set the recommendation its performers deserve. Those less concerned about my strong reservations regarding both work and performance will find the set a good introduction to one of Handel’s lesser large-scale works.

Brian Robins

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The Trials of Tenducci

CD cover The trials of Tenducci

The Trials of Tenducci
A Castrato in Ireland
Tara Erraught mezzo-soprano, Irish Baroque Orchestra, Peter Whelan
65:57
Linn Records CKD 639
Music by Arne, J. C. Bach, Fischer, Giordani, van Maldere & Mozart

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The soprano castrato Giusto Ferdinando Tenducci, born in Siena around 1735, led a life that was colourful even by the standards of his profession. Jailed for debt on more than one occasion, he held a magnetic appeal to women, an attraction that led to a notorious scandal when he married a young pupil in Dublin. After spending the earlier part of his career singing minor roles in such European centres as Milan, Naples, Venice and Dresden, Tenducci arrived in London in 1758. There, following his first spell in a debtors’ prison, he created the role of Arbaces in Thomas Arne’s English opera seria Artaxerses in 1762, a success he later repeated in both Dublin and Edinburgh. Particularly well regarded in lyrical music, Tenducci spent his later years in London, Dublin and Italy, where he died in Genoa in 1790.

As the title suggests, this pleasing CD sets out to give a musical snapshot of Tenducci’s connections with Dublin, even if somewhat tenuously at times  – Mozart’s Exultate, jubilate seems to have gained admission solely by dint of the fact that he wrote a now-lost scena for Tenducci when in 1778 the latter met Mozart in Paris in the company of their mutual friend, J. C. Bach. It is given a very capable performance by mezzo Tara Erraught, whose attractive tone and warmth are heard to particular advantage in the second aria (‘Tu virginum’), where we even get a cadential trill, though the continuous vibrato may be more to the taste of general listeners than early music enthusiasts. But she copes well with the coloratura of the first aria and ‘Alleluia’ and as throughout the programme is accompanied neatly, if in quicker music rather clipped fashion, by the IBO.

A more direct connection with Dublin can be found in the brief and agreeable if not especially distinctive three-movement Symphony in G by the Belgian Pierre van Maldere, a leading figure in the Fishamble Street concert series between 1751 and 1753. The inclusion of extracts from Artaxerses, which ran for a record 33 performances in Dublin, was obviously a given, as were the two arias of Arbaces chosen, the bravura ‘Amid a thousand racking woes’, which Erraught doesn’t always have fully under control in the upper register, and the show’s hit number, ‘Water parted from the sea’, sensitively done, if not entirely without diction problems.   

Tommaso Giordani was another Italian to spend considerable time in Dublin, having been part of a touring opera family that first visited in 1764 and then again in the 1780s, when he founded an opera company that went bankrupt. Two of Giordani’s songs that were particularly associated with Tenducci are included, along with his three-movement overture to the pantomime The Island of Saints (1785). The final movement is a rumbustious medley of traditional Irish jigs and reels, here despatched with great aplomb by the IBO. Another popular Irish melody, ‘Gramachree Molly’ forms the theme for the set of variations that concludes J. C. Fischer’s Oboe Concerto No 7 in F, here very well played by Andreas Helm. Another opera premiered by Tenducci, Mortellari’s Arsace (Padua, 1775) includes a scena consisting of a strongly declamatory accompagnato and aria later adapted for and dedicated to Tenducci by his friend J. C. Bach. It is capably sung by Erraught, though director Peter Whelan’s flowery fortepiano continuo arpeggiations in the recitative are to my mind not in the best taste.

All in all, the CD is an interesting, well-performed showcase of music in and around Tenducci’s Dublin, albeit perhaps in the final analysis not one likely to set the Liffey on fire. 

Brian Robins

 

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Frederick II: Flute Sonatas

CD cover Frederick II Flute sonatas on Naxos

Claudia Stein flute, Andreas Greger cello, Alessandro De Marchi fortepiano
77:37
Naxos 8.574250

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Adolph Menzel’s stunning painting of Frederick the Great presenting a candle-lit flute concert with his chamber orchestra attests to the fact that the Prussian king was no mere dilettante, a fact reinforced by his cultivation of a number of the finest musicians in Europe at his court, as well as his own surviving music for flute. The performers here present six of Frederick’s flute sonatas, as well as a set of variations for flute and continuo by Alessandro De Marchi on one of them, the C major sonata, a cello piece by De Marchi and piano music by Friedrich Wilhelm Marpurg. The royal sonatas prove to be both imaginative, and perhaps unsurprisingly make superb use of the flute. These recordings are lent a rather distinctive colour by the continuo use of fortepiano and Baroque cello, but puzzlingly, and a little disappointingly, Claudia Stein plays a modern flute. She has a good grasp of the idiom of this music, but her tone is rather metallic, a feature exaggerated by the rather ‘close’ recording of her instrument. It does seem odd to me to combine a modern solo instrument with such a delightfully period continuo ensemble – the variety of tonal textures the fortepiano contributed is a revelation. On the other hand, four of the works here are receiving their world premiere recordings and the rest are hardly well known, so the musicians are to be congratulated in their presentation of this underrated repertoire.

D. James Ross

Categories
Recording

Amavi

Music for Viols and Voices by Michael East
Fieri Consort, Chelys Consort of Viols
71:14
BIS-2503 SACD

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This admirable collaboration between the voices of the Fieri Consort and the viols of the Chelys Consort brings us the complete five-part fantasias by Michael East for viols of 1610, interspersed with madrigals and verse anthems by the composer. East seems to be a composer doomed these days to be a filler on CDs of more familiar composers of the period, and it is about time a CD like this declared his considerable virtues. This seems doubly relevant, as East gave Latin names to his eight fantasias, indicating a progression from guilt through repentance to love, and clearly suggesting that he viewed them as an integrated sequence. One of the chief delights of this CD is to be able to evaluate this collection in its entirety at the same time enjoying the superlative choral music – who realised for instance that East’s settings of “When David Heard” and “O Clap your Hands” deserve a place beside those of his more illustrious contemporaries? The Fieri Consort produce a wonderfully pure tone that complements perfectly the sound of the viols, and both young ensembles are to be congratulated for their technical and musical excellence, but also for their imaginative programming. The CD concludes with a newly commissioned work by contemporary composer, Jill Jarman, a restlessly charming setting of a text by Sir Henry Wotton.

D. James Ross