The Marian Consort, Rory McCleery
60:55
Delphian DCD34176
[dropcap]F[/dropcap]rom Emma Walsh’s exquisite opening phrase to Ave Regina caelorum which seems to descend from heaven itself this CD is an absolute delight and a masterclass in one-to-a-part singing. Gesualdo’s Sacrae Cantiones for five voices book 1 of 1603 contains some of his most sublime compositions, quirky and original in style but without the tortured harmonic progressions and off-the-wall phrases of some of his other compositions. The effortlessly polished singing of the Marian Consort makes them the ideal advocates of this repertoire, and their perfectly contoured and beautifully balanced ensemble sound is captured in crystal-clear quality by the Delphian engineers. Anybody who is in doubt about Gesualdo’s skill as a composer will be persuaded by these understated but perfect accounts, and at the same time will be impressed by the passion which the singers manage to invest in their performances without resorting to rawness or roughness of any kind. A complete delight.
Music from The Eton Choirbook Vol. 4
The Choir of Christ Church Cathedral, Oxford, Stephen Darlington
68:42
Avie AV 2359
John Browne Salve regina I & II
Horwood Gaude flore virginali
Stratford Magnificat
[dropcap]T[/dropcap]he fourth volume in the Avie’s superb exploration of the Eton Choirbook brings us two superb Salve Reginas by John Browne, the Magnificat by William, Monk of Stratford and William Horwood’s Gaude flore virginali. Again and again I was stuck by Stephen Darlington’s affinity with this music: his instinctive choice of effective tempi, his effortless transitions from section to section and his masterly overview of these largescale works. Impressive too, as in the previous volumes, is the ability of his singers to transition effortlessly from tutti to solo singers and back again. A cathedral choir is an entity which like a vintage wine changes flavour over time, and one factor in this is the unpredictable boy treble section. Some listeners to Browne’s first Salve Regina may feel that the solo and tutti boy treble sound is not quite as sweet as on the choir’s previous recordings in the series, but to my mind this is just an aspect of the natural evolution of any choir’s sound. The more familiar of the two Browne Salve reginas is for the standard five-part ‘Eton’ choir and the Oxford choristers rise well to its challenges. The other setting, remarkably receiving its premiere recording here, is set for TTTBarB and also proves to be a stunning masterpiece, muscular and dynamic. The Monk of Stratford’s Magnificat is also for adult male voices, and it too allows the remarkable lower voices of the choir to shine. William Horwood’s SATTB setting of Gaude flore virginali, also receiving its premiere recording, proves to be a work of profound inspiration and invention. To my ear the treble contribution here sounds more mellow too. It is remarkable to think that music of such superlative quality is still being rediscovered, and full congratulations are due to Avie and to Stephen Darlington and his choir for their ongoing project.
Benvenue Fortepiano Trio with Carla Moore violin and Jodi Levitz viola
59:48
Avie AV 2365
[dropcap]I[/dropcap] really wanted to like this recording of some of my favourite Schumann chamber music – indeed I have been looking for a fine period instrument recording of the piano quintet. This recording has much to recommend it. The Märchenbilder for viola and piano are given passionate and lyrical accounts by Jodi Levitz and Eric Zivian while the less familiar Fünf Stücke im Volkston are revealed by Zivian and Tanya Tomkins to be works of colourful and evocative imagination. However in both these works I was aware of the rather uncomfortably close and slightly dead recording, and this proved to be more of an issue with the piano quintet, perhaps simply because of the involvement of more players. However there also seemed to me to be a slight lack of lustre to the actual playing, and it perhaps due to this that I was also aware of some slightly uncomfortable intonation. I am at a loss to account for these shortcomings in a CD from Avie, a company usually at the forefront of recorded quality, although I note that the recording was made in the USA by an independent recording company. This is a pity, as I feel that in a more supported recording environment this would have been a recording I would have felt very differently about.
Nos 1– 4 Pasticcio Concertos
Ronald Brautigam fortepiano, Die Kölner Akademie, Michael Alexander Willens
58:34
BIS-2094 SACD
[dropcap]O[/dropcap]nce taken as early evidence of the 11-year-old Mozart’s prodigious compositional genius, these first four piano concertos are now recognised as cunning pastiches pieced together from chamber works by Hermann Friedrich Raupach, Leontzi Honauer, Johann Gottfried Eckard, C. P. E. Bach and Johann Schobert. To what extent this music was recycled into piano concertos by Mozart himself, or more likely substantially assisted by his father, is unclear but the results are very pleasing indeed. Orchestrated for the sort of generous band the Mozarts encountered on tour at this time which included flutes, oboes, horns and trumpets, these are important works in what used to be called the ‘pre-classical’ style – essentially the charming vocabulary of the Mannheim school. Playing a beautiful cherry-wood fortepiano by Paul McNulty after Stein 1788, Ronald Brautigam gives stunningly precise and expressive accounts of these works, ably supported by the Kölner Akademie directed by Michael Alexander Willens. In crystal clear recordings by the BIS engineers, this music comes vividly to life, and one can just picture the young Mozart, bewigged and liveried, raising gasps of wonderment and admiration for his aristocratic audiences. I was struck by the imaginative richness of composers who have largely fallen from public attention and who we can definitely say influenced Mozart’s compositional style. I was also impressed by the smooth recycling process which produced four very fine concertos, which you would never guess were anything other than original compositions. The fact that until recently they were believed to be such is a great testimony to the work of the Mozarts.
[dropcap]V[/dropcap]ol. 7 of Suzuki’s Secular cantatas explores the scoring of the Peasant Cantata that has soprano and bass soloists and a flute and horn in addition to strings and continuo, and so couples it with the two secular cantatas that set Italian texts, Non sa che sia dolore which has prominent flute obbligati with the soprano and Amore traditore for the bass.
The potpourri of folk music, tavern songs and social commentary in the ‘Peasant Cantata’ provide Bach with a licence to step outside his normal, serious style and let us see something of his social life and more rustic context.The music is tuneful, but rarely moving. I found Erdmann a more convincing soloist in this semi-operatic burlesque, with her nimble voice and dramatic sense of expression, and certainly she is very at home in the anguish of leave-taking that is the core of Non sa che sia dolore. Wörner’s background is in church music, and hitherto I have heard him most under Suzuki in the church cantatas. This suggests to my ears he is rather too ‘correct’ in a role where a certain amount of rustic jollity, rolling in the hay and raising a glass could do with a more plummy sound: he sounds a bit prim for his more racy lyrics! I though he was better in Amore traditore.The playing – specially the flute and horn (as well as the unattributed Dudelsack) – is fine, without, in the strings especially, quite capturing every dramatic innuendo. Suzuki’s players don’t, as far as I know, play many Mozart operas and you really need that sense of underscoring the drama that those who play in opera pits absorb over time.
But this is a worthy part of the Suzuki oeuvre, and given that there are few recordings of all the secular cantatas, will be widely welcomed.
[dropcap]A[/dropcap]s noted in my report of the 2015 Ambronay Festival, an excellent reason for going to the last weekend of the festival in early October is its incorporation of a ‘festival within a festival’, the competition for young early music ensembles held under the auspices of eeemerging, an EU initiative (and, no, I’m not going there). Each concert of some 45 minutes length takes place before a team of judges from Ambronay’s festival partners and an enthusiastic audience, which is also encouraged to participate by selecting its own winner. Once again six ensembles were chosen, this year from 47 applications (down on last year). Once again the first, perhaps most important, thing to say is that it is immensely uplifting to see so many exceptionally gifted young musicians involved in this kind of exercise.
That said these gifts do not always take right the direction, as the opening concert on the morning of 8 October demonstrated. This was given by Nexus, an ensemble consisting of two recorders, cello and keyboard playing 17th-century Italian works by Legrenzi, Castello, Marini, in addition to featuring vocal items by Merula, Barbara Strozzi and Monteverdi sung by mezzo Marielou Jacquard. Sadly, as with one of the ensembles last year, Nexus showed scant evidence of having paid attention to 17th-century style, their performances showing little sign of nuance, colour or the bizzarie (imagination) so essential if this music is truly to come to life. I find it odd and not a little depressing that talented young musicians such as these are not getting (or seeking?) more guidance on matters of musicology and style. The succeeding program by I Discordanti, a vocal quartet with continuo support of gamba, theorbo and harpsichord featured repertoire from much the same period. They perhaps concentrated a little too heavily on chromaticism (it really is time Luigi Rossi’s ubiquitous ‘Toccata settima’ was given a rest), but brought a welcome sense of the stylistic needs of the music. This was particularly true of two extended cantatas by Rossi, which were well projected. I Discordanti are not yet the finished article, but they deserve every encouragement.
The opening concert of the afternoon session introduced Prisma, yet another ensemble that specialises in early 17th-century instrumental music (Cima, Bertali, Salomone Rossi etc.), its membership being violin, recorder, gamba and archlute. Their approach was a striking advance on that of Nexus. Violinist Franciska Hajdu not only possesses an excellent technique but has also taken the trouble to employ a 17th-century ‘Biber’ bow (though not yet to have her violin set up with low tension strings) and throughout played with a real sense of style well matched by her partner, recorder player Elisabeth Champollion. The continuo playing was equally of a high standard and I would not quarrel with voting that saw Prisma end up with the audience prize. For me their main competitors were the succeeding Goldfinch Ensemble, an ensemble of former students of The Hague Royal Conservatoire comprising of violin, flute, gamba and harpsichord. They were particularly impressive in technically accomplished and expressively musical performances of two fine trio sonatas by Élisabeth Jacquet de La Guerre. This is another group that is certainly worth keeping an eye on.
On the following morning two remaining ensembles presented programmes, the first of which was mainly devoted to Haydn’s wonderful late String Quartet, op 77/1 in G. The performers were the very young-looking Consone Quartet, who had a very good shot at a work they will play better when their own maturity comes closer to matching that of the music. This was particularly true of the Adagio, one of Haydn’s most deeply profound quartet movements. Finally The Curious Bards, an ensemble based in nearby Lyon that specialises in the research and performance of traditional Irish and Scottish airs and dances. Their programme of 18th-century arrangements was put across with great accomplishment and verve, but I would question the validity of its inclusion in this context. And isn’t there something rather ridiculous about an audience sitting in serried rows in a 21st-century concert hall listening to music that was never intended for such a purpose? Still, to avoid ending what was overall another joyous experience on a sour note, it must be confessed that said audience loved The Curious Bards.
Bach: Goldberg Variations
Buxtehude: La Capricciosa (2 CDs in a jewel case)
Capriccio C5286
[dropcap]C[/dropcap]hristine Schornsheim has recorded the Goldberg Variations before (in 1997) and more recently has become known for her complete Haydn and perhaps more as an exponent of the fortepiano and other late Baroque and Classical keyboard instruments. She is now professor of period keyboard instruments at the Munich academy, and is committed to teaching as well as playing.
She was persuaded to make a second recording say the liner notes by Christof Kern, whose workshop produced the harpsichord on which she plays in 2013. It is a double ‘after’ the Michael Mietke in Berlin dated to around 1710, (a maker from whom Bach is known to have secured an instrument for Köthen when he served there) and is extended to a full five octaves and strung with brass. It is a powerful instrument, and the frequent registration changes are made silently – presumably edited out.
This time Schornsheim prefaces the 32 Goldberg variations with Buxtehude’s La Capricciosa, BuxWV 230, a set of 32 partitas on an Italianate-sounding Bergamesca as his theme. In both sets, the technical challenges increase as the works progress, and in both cases the listener is left wondering if there is going to be any other possible invention left.
I have become used to other performers’ versions of the Buxtehude – notably Lars Ulrich Mortensen and Colin Booth, and I found Schornsheim’s Buxtehude less satisfying. She plays with an incredible fluency but constant registration changes and a pretty driven rhythmic style make it rather unyielding for my taste. But linking the two works is a fine idea. And I suspect she is more at home with her oft-performed Goldbergs. Here the rather more expansive music seems to breathe more freely, and the changes in registration more obvious: I have certainly enjoyed performances of the Goldbergs on the organ occasionally.
The instrument is recorded pretty close, and her finger-work is fluent if just slightly mechanical. It certainly shows off Christof Kern’s instrument splendidly. It is tuned in a meantone tuning at 415 for the Buxtehude, and then in a version of Kirnberger III based on D for the Bach. If this was close to the sound that Bach favoured, then we owe Kern a debt.
[dropcap]T[/dropcap]his is the second in a series exploring ‘neglected or newly discovered chamber music 1600-1800’. The first was of Quantz’s Op. 2. There’s certainly plenty to explore with the prolific and very capable Boismortier: has anyone heard or played all eight of his collections of flute duets? Here, however, we have Op. 51 for flute and violin and very charming they are, a most agreeable and varied listen. Much of the time the violin part is a high bass line to more ornate flute writing but there also more democratic contrapuntal movements as well as quasi-three-part writing via double-stopping. The playing is very accomplished (though there is an odd-sounding moment in the middle of track 10) with clear articulation, neat ornaments and sense of space to the phrasing. The booklet is as comprehensive as one could wish (though in English only) but there is one incorrect cross reference to the track list.
[dropcap]I[/dropcap]t may not bother others, but for my taste these performances tinker too much with Rameau’s instrumentation to earn a recommendation. Yes, I know that alternatives are offered by the composer but I find it ineffective and fussy to change instrumentation between the movements of a concert, let alone within them. And while there’s no reason not to transcribe other Rameau movements for these forces please present these movements as a discrete suite. Had J-P wanted the second concert to start with an overture he’d have written one. There are some nice touches in the interpretations but I’m afraid I may have been too irritated to notice them all. The booklet does not include a track list.
Salomé Haller, Sarah Gendrot, Rolf Ehlers, Benoît Haller, Philip Niederberger SSATB, ensemble3 vocal et instrumental, Hans Michael Beuerle
59:35
Carus 83.391
[dropcap]C[/dropcap]arus has become quite a force in the vocal/choral music world, publishing excellent editions at sensible prices and a very useful series of companion recordings, some of epic proportions (anyone for 10 CDs of Rheinberger’s sacred vocal music?). They publish both the works on this recording and I for one will be buying and performing them. Campra’s Requiem may be mysterious in origin and have an unorthodox tonal scheme but it is nevertheless a really fine work, well served by this recording in which the forces are conspicuously all on the same side. The integration of choral, instrumental and solo elements is consistently neat. There are a few intonation issues in the Sanctus for the baritone soloist and solo ensembles in general do not always meet perfectly on unisons at cadences but none of this prevented my enjoying either the mass or the accompanying De profundis, also a very strong work. The booklet (Ger/Eng/Fre) is not immune from minor translation oddities but is both thorough and complete (essay, biograghies, Latin translated into all the modern languages used elsewhere).
David Hansell
