early music review

Juliane Laake gamba, Ensemble art d’echo
72:30
Capriccio C 5206

[dropcap]T[/dropcap]his is an exceptionally interesting recording of a ‘new’ repertoire, still to be made generally available, of the highest quality. The manuscript, currently held in France, possibly originated in north Germany. It appears to have been compiled over several decades, and contains music for solo bass viol, notated entirely in tablature. There are 273 pieces in all, some in variant tunings, some named, (Hotman, Dubuisson and Verdussen) most traceable by concordances (Hume, Ford, Jenkins, Stöeffken and others). The manuscript contains dance movements arranged in suites, several incorporating settings of chorales.

The recording presents six of these suites, some with their chorales. These are very beautifully sung by the tenor in a simple and direct manner, some unaccompanied, some with viol, some with theorbo and organ in various combinations. Thus the programme has a pleasing variety, and makes very enjoyable listening.

I’ve enjoyed Juliane Laake’s superb playing every time I’ve heard it, and her accompanying artists (Kai Roterberg voice, Ophira Zakai theorbo and Klaus Eichhorn organ) are of the same calibre. She plays with absolute technical mastery, completely without mannerism and with compelling musicianship.

The music itself is captivating. The dance suites are French in form and style, and more than once I was reminded of Sainte Colombe. The chorale tunes are followed by sonorous chordal versions for solo viol, sometimes in standard tuning, sometimes in ‘skordatur’. I couldn’t pick up all the tunings, but one sounded like a version of the so-called Bandora set, the suite nominally in G but sounding in (modern pitch) F. Its Gavotte is the tune ‘When the King enjoys his own again’. She plays a 7-string copy of a late 17th-century Tielke which has a very full bass and a beautifully warm top string.

The recording is closely miked in a favourable acoustic, with a lovely ambience particularly around the top string. It nevertheless sounds quite intimate, in keeping with the music, as the chorales and their versions for solo viol would have been for private devotions.

The notes state that she improvises some divisions, and I can’t check what she does with the written source, but whatever she does must be completely appropriate as it was impossible to distinguish what was hers and what was original. I look forward to the time when the facsimile, which Minkoff had planned to publish, eventually becomes available as it is clearly a very important source of 17th-century music for bass viol.

A lot of research has gone into this programme: chorale settings by Praetorius, Walther, Gesius and others have been sought out to go with the versions for viol from the manuscript. The result is a programme of very beautiful music, set into a context, and presented in such a way that the 40 separate tracks make for a very moving whole. Congratulations to all concerned.

Robert Oliver

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Ana Quintans soprano, Concerto de’ Cavalieri, Marcello Di Lisa
deutsche harmonia mundi 8 88750 81922 2
Arias from Ardelinda,* L’Eraclea,* Le gare generose,* L’inconstanza schernita,* La Statira; sinfonia from Zenobia, Concerto a cinque op. 5/5, Sinfonia Si7 in g
*=world premiere recordings

[dropcap]I[/dropcap] have mixed emotions about this recording. I was moved to tears by Quintans as Jonathan in Charpentier’s sacred opera at the Edinburgh Festival a few years ago, but was not immediately taken by her interpretations of Albinoni’s unsurprisingly glorious music for voice. Repeated listening brought a change of heart; maybe the more Italian’s more virtuosic but (broadly speaking) less emotive writing was the “problem”? But hearing the disc several times actually convinced me that it was the overall approach to the music that niggled me most – the fast music felt uncomfortably hurried, especially by the time we reached the minutely manicured final cadences (complete with obligatory delay before the placing of the very last chord!) Some arias are accompanied by full orchestra (44221 + oboes – without bassoon – trumpets and drums, flute, plucker and harpsichord), while others are taken by a pair of solo violins – and very nicely, too. Interspersed with the vocal items are three instrumental pieces; here again, the outer movements go hell for leather, while the slower ones were dominated by harpsichord links and flourishes. The booklet note reads like a music dictionary article on “Albinoni and the theatre”, telling us all about the works and the venues where they were performed but nothing at all about the individual items; while that is printed in four languages, the poetic texts are given (on separate pages) in Italian and English only. It is only in the closing credits that one discovers that the flute obbligato (written “in the pure and fascinating Venetian tradition”) was reconstructed (to what extent is not shared with us!) by Guido Morini. To summarize, some delightful music and an elegant, virtuosic singer, but perhaps worthy of a less histrionic approach?

Brian Clark

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Les Ambassadeurs, Alexis Kossenko flute, Zefira Valova violin
70:23
Alpha 200
TWV 51: D1, D2, a1, 52: e3, 55: F3

[dropcap]A[/dropcap]s the title suggests, this excellent disc has an orchestral suite (strings with pairs of horns and oboes plus bassoon) and four concertos, two for flute, one for violin and one for both. Regular readers will know that I am a fan of Telemann’s music, so it will come as no surprise that, when it’s as well played as it is here, I have no hesitation in recommending Les Ambassadeurs. The dance movements of the suite will have the most reticent of toes tapping, and each of the concerti – think elegant Albinoni or Marcello rather than virtuosic display à la Vivaldi and you’ll have the right idea – is finely crafted by composer and performers alike; I was particularly impressed by the opening of the A minor violin concerto – the throbbing upper string chords leading into Valova’s first entry are captivating, and her colourful interpretation of that sinuous solo line (a masterclass in the use of vibrato as an ornament, and right hand control) meant listening to that track over and over again. That astonishing control is key to Les Ambassadeurs’ approach, and I hope they will go on to explore more German repertoire.

Brian Clark

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