early music review

[Veronika Winter, Alex Potter, Hans Jörg Mammel, Markus Flaig SATB]
L’arpa festante, Rien Voskuilen
78:11
Carus 83.337
Graupner Vergnügte Ruh Heinichen Herr nun lässest du
Telemann Ich hebe meine Augen auf, Ouverture TWV55: Es4

[dropcap]T[/dropcap]he title of the disc is a slight misnomer – although Graupner, like Heinichen and Telemann, studied in Leipzig and participated in the city’s rich musical life, his impressive setting of Georg Christian Lehms’ Vergnügte Ruh was written in 1711, i. e. the year after he was “headhunted” to take charge of music at the court of Hessen-Darmstadt. No such worries about the Telemann piece, which is based on the earliest datable autograph source for a sacred piece by the composer. Veronika Winter and Markus Flaig sing the psalm beautifully (four of the six movements are duets, the others being arias). Pace Michael Maul’s otherwise excellent booklet note, Graupner’s cantata is not scored for two flutes (as given in the translation – he actually wrote Flöten, which would normally be given as “recorders”), two muted violins and two “violettas”; the surviving original material also includes traverso and two violas. Veronika Winter is outstanding; she sings the coloratura with extraordinary ease and takes great care to shape the sustained notes. Thought to have been written for his collegium musicum, Telemann’s Overture in E flat might be an assemblage of nine movements taken from a now-lost opera; seemingly group in threes (each set ending with a pair of dances), titles include Entrée and Aria. The text of the Heinichen work is built around the Nunc dimittis. Two “choral” movements (which both begin with declamation but move into fugue) present the words from St Luke’s gospel, while two arias for bass, one for tenor and a duet reflect upon similar texts. Musically, Heinichen frames the piece cleverly – the opening sinfonia’s second section is an instrumental presentation of the chorale with which the work ends, but before that the voices (initially accompanied only by continuo) have sung a chorale fantasy on the same melody. As a further attempt to contextualize Bach, this CD is a very welcome addition to the catalogue.

Brian Clark

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Ensemble La Ninfea
69:45
Raumklang RK 3308
Music by Chambonnières, Marais, Sainte-Colombe, Toinon & the Saizenay manuscript

[dropcap]T[/dropcap]he Man in the Iron Mask has been the subject of books, films and much speculation about his identity. He may just have been a valet but there have been claims that he was an illegitimate half-brother of Louis XIV, a disgraced French general or an Italian diplomat. The one certain fact is that he died in the Bastille in 1703 after more than thirty years in several different French prisons where elaborate precautions were taken to hide his identity. On the assumption that the prisoner was not just a servant but had access to music, German ensemble La Ninfea present a programme of French baroque music designed not to cheer the prisoner in his lonely cell but rather to reflect his desperate situation. There are pieces for two recorders and continuo, duets for two gambas, solos for recorder or gamba with continuo and two for solo theorbo. The prevailing melancholy mood is lightened by the occasional fast movement and in two sets of arrangements by La Ninfea of music originally adapted for theorbo by Robert de Visée. On the whole the programme flows nicely along with stylish performances of some beautiful music, but this is perhaps not a CD to listen to if you are already feeling depressed.

Victoria Helby

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Alex McCartney lute
Veterum Musica – details below the review
Suites in B flat, f and C

[dropcap]R[/dropcap]ené Mésangeau (fl 1567-1638) was one of the pioneers of what was to become the Baroque lute, not least through his experiments in lute tuning that led to the ‘standard’ Baroque lute tuning based around a D minor chord. After a time in Germany he returned to his native Paris and the Court of Louis XIII. Three Suites are included on this CD, in B flat, F minor and C, the latter Suite including two movements by an anonymous composer. Each suite opens with an unmeasured prelude following by groups of Allemandes and Courantes, finishing with Sarabandes or a Chaconne. The playing is sensitive and musical (albeit with a fair bit of finger noise), the acoustic adding a nice resonance to the sound, particularly in the many pieces at low pitch. The sleeve notes are minimal, and there is no indication of track or total timings – something to watch out for if you want anybody to broadcast tracks.

Andrew Benson-Wilson

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David Miller baroque lutes
68:21
Timespan TS1401
Sonatas 5 in d & 30 in g, Prelude & Fantasie in c, Prelude in D, Campanella in D, Passagaille in D, Giga in D

[dropcap]T[/dropcap]he thoughtful and reflective mood of the opening D minor Prelude sets the scene for this enthralling CD of lute music by Silvius Leopold Weiss. I was introduced to the music of Weiss by David Miller in a Dartington concert in the mid 90s. An almost exact contemporary of J. S. Bach and Handel, Weiss spent time in Rome (alongside Handel and Scarlatti) before settling as lutenist to the Dresden Court. His visit to Berlin produced the ‘Famous Weiss’ comment from the sister of the future Frederick the Great. The two Sonatas (in practice, multi-movement suites) from the Dresden manuscripts are nicely contrasted, the simpler D minor suite forming a foil to the more substantial, elaborate and musically advanced G minor set. Of the six other pieces from a British Library manuscript, the Prelude in C minor, with its distinctive octave opening, shows Weiss’s imaginative use of harmonic modulation, a factor specifically mentioned in relation to a competition with Bach in Dresden. As the opening Prelude demonstrates, David Miller plays with a particular sensitivity to musical ebb and flow, as well as producing a beautifully rich and refined tone.

Andrew Benson-Wilson

Fabio Bonizzoni, La Risonanza
63:17
Glossa GCD C81505

[dropcap]T[/dropcap]his is a re-release of a 2000 recording. Giuseppe was the elder brother of the better known Giovanni Battista. Born in 1695, he left Milan for London in 1728, where he stayed until his death in 1750, making quite a name for himself. These concertos, published after his death for “Harpsichord or Organ”, are domestic in scale, with just two violins, cello and bass alongside the organ. It is not clear when they were composed, but they have more of a Rococo than Baroque feel to them, rather enhanced by the playing style on this CD. The spiky solo registrations are not in keeping with the English organ of the period, and nor is the over-articulated performance style. Bonizzoni keeps to the two-part structure of most of the organ solos (without infilling the harmonies, a debatable point for this repertoire), but it is a shame that he doesn’t make more of the organ when in its continuo role – it is more-or-less inaudible. The notes give no information on the organ, but I have a feeling it is later than this repertoire. It is certainly not in any English or Italian early to mid 18th-century style. Two lively little Sonatas by Giovanni Battista Sammartini complete the disc.

Andrew Benson-Wilson

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Ulrike Hofbauer, Ensemble &cetera
71:53
Raumklang RK 3306
Music by Berti, Carissimi, Castaldi, Ferrari, Frescobaldi, Huygens, D’India, de Macque, Mayone, Mazzocchi, Merula, Nauwach, Orlandi, Rasi, Luigi Rossi, Barbara Strozzi & Trabaci

[dropcap]T[/dropcap]his CD takes us on a tour of the rich 17th-century Italian repertoire for solo voice and continuo. The success or failure of such an enterprise relies heavily on the prowess of the soloist, and Ulrike Hofbauer has a lovely voice and a ready sense of the drama inherent in the music she is singing. She is helped considerably here by a small but inspired consort of instruments consisting of arpa doppia, chitarrone and lirone alternating with a treble viol. They come into their own in the lovely instrumental works which punctuate the programme and which they play with a wonderful freedom and spon-taneity. These are qualities which they also bring to their accompanying, allowing them to respond appropriately to Hofbauer’s creative interpretation of the vocal lines. The programme note addresses the rather oxymoronic title of the CD by explaining that the voice is in dialogue with the listener, and certainly this is a recording which demands your undivided attention and, with its constantly changing colours and moods, fully earns it. All the big names of the period are here – Trabaci, Carissimi, Gastoldi, Frescobaldi, Strozzi, D’India, Merula and Luigi Rossi – but the performers have looked beyond the obvious to the less familiar and have included works by the likes of Camillo Orlandi, Giovanni Pietro Berti and Giovanni de Macque. Accounts of the singing of the 17th-century Roman soprano Leonora Baroni suggest that she augmented her singing with gestures and appropriate movements like an opera singer, and listening to this music it is easy to imagine such dramatization working extremely effectively.

D. James Ross

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