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Around Baermann

CD cover Around Baermann 19th-century clarinet music

Maryse Legault clarinet, Gili Loftus, fortepiano
71:11
Leaf Music LM265 (www.leaf-music.ca)

Born in Potsdam, Heinrich Baerman (1784-1847) was the great clarinet virtuoso of the early 19th century, a pupil of Joseph Beer, who in his turn had revolutionised clarinet playing late in the previous century. As such, Baerman, who for most of his career was first clarinet of the court orchestra in Munich, had contact with many of the leading composers of the day. These links owed much not only to his reputation as a virtuoso but also to his apparently congenial personality. The present CD includes two works by Baerman himself, an improvisatory Introduction and bright Polonaise (op 25), and a Nocturne in several sections, the most appealing of which is the lovely cantabile melody that follows the unexpectedly (given the title of the work) lively opening. Neither reveal Baerman to have been more than a modestly talented composer.

As might be expected, the works by Weber and Mendelssohn are a different matter. Weber’s connections with Baerman are more significant than those with any other major composer since, after their meeting in 1811, they not only toured together but Weber also composed several works for Baerman. They include his two clarinet concertos and a quintet.  The Variations on a theme from the Opera ‘Silvana’, op 33, are a particularly interesting example of collaboration between composer and performer, having according to an anecdote cited in Maryse Legault’s helpful notes been composed together over the course of one night. One wonders how much liquid refreshment might have been added to the mix! It’s an attractive set of a theme and seven variations based on an aria from Weber’s Silvana, first given in Frankfurt in 1810. The theme sounds like the seeds of something that might have re-emerged in the music for Agathe in Der Freischütz. Also premiered by Baerman and Weber was the virtuosic Grand Duo Concertant, op 48, first performed in 1815, while the CD programme is completed by Mendelssohn’s  three-movement Sonata in E flat of 1824, a work astonishingly not published until 1941 in New York. In addition there is a digital bonus in the shape of a three-movement Sonatina by Caroline Schleicher-Krähmer (1794-1873), the daughter of musicians who in addition to having been the first woman clarinettist to play in public also played the piano and violin professionally. The Sonatina – which includes a Waltz (ii) and Polacca (iii) is pleasing enough, if never aspiring to be more than salon music.

‘Mr Baerman does wonders on the clarinet, but he charms as much as he amazes’. These words quoted by Legault from a review published in the Gazette de France in 1818 might well with slight adjustment be applied to Maryse Legault herself. A native of Montreal, she studied with Erich Hoeprich, the father-figure of the revival of the historical clarinet. Not only does she own to an exceptional technique but equally a beautiful evenly produced tone across the range. She plays with real musicality and considerable nuance, as the slight change of dynamic in the repeated phrases in the statement of the theme the Weber variations immediately announces. The third variation of the same work demonstrates her ability to encompass a wide tessitura and virtuoso leaps, while her mezzo voce playing can be heard to ravishing effect at the end of the central movement of the composer’s Grand Duo. She seems, too, to have an exceptional rapport with her accompanist, Gili Loftus, herself evidently an outstanding fortepianist (she also plays the harpsichord and modern piano). She is especially impressive in the Mendelssohn, which needs some demanding bravura work from the keyboard player. Her instrument here is a copy of a Viennese fortepiano from 1820 and 1840 inspired by Conrad Graf and Ignaz Bösendorfer and built by Rodney J Regier of Freeport, Maine in 2000. The sound as recorded is full and rounded across the range.

An exceptional disc. well worthy of investigation by any one attracted to the historical clarinet – or indeed the exceptionally talented young performers. 

Brian Robins

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Recording

Haydn No.14 – L’Impériale

CD cover Haydn No.14 – L’Impériale Antonini

Kammerorchester Basel, conducted by Giovanni Antonini
77:07
Alpha Classics 694

Giovanni Antonini’s Haydn cycle, with his own Il Giardino Armonico and the Kammerorchester Basel alternating, here turns its attention to three symphonies plus an alternative finale for No 53 in D. It is from the nickname for that symphony, a 19th-century acquisition, that the programme takes it theme. All three symphonies are celebratory in character, with trumpets and timpani to enhance the grandeur, though they were a later addition in the case of No 53. The earliest, No 33 in C, is a pre-Esterháza work and is indeed with its twin No 32 in C the first of Haydn’s symphonies to include trumpets and drums. It was composed during the short period Haydn was in the employment of Count Morzin (c 1759-60). Cast in four movements, it opens with a Vivace that brings some champagne-like sparkle and agility from the superb Basel strings, a tranquil Andante scored only for strings, a pompous Minuet that unlike many of Haydn’s remains firmly in the ballroom, and an Allegro finale full of quirky humour made much of by Antonini and his orchestra. Oddly only passing mention of the symphony is made in the otherwise informative notes, suggesting that perhaps its inclusion to make for the unusually long playing time was a late decision.

One of the ever-increasing problems with Antonini’s cycle for a reviewer is to find something new to say about performances that up to this point have been remarkably consistent, whichever orchestra he is directing. Both produce superb playing for him, with unflagging dynamic energy brought to outer movements, insightful sensitivity to slower ones, while the bucolic extroversion that characterises many of the minuets is consistently infectious. Perhaps question marks may arise over a fast tempo, such as the secondary idea in the opening Vivace of No 53. Perhaps a little more warmth might have been brought to the odd cantabile movement, though that is certainly not the case here where the Adagio assai of No 54 – the only true slow movement on the disc and one of the longest Haydn ever wrote – takes on a mesmerizingly nocturnal mood.

Symphonies 53 and 54 both belong to the Esterháza period. No 53, first performed in 1778, is – to put it inelegantly –something of a dog’s dinner of a work. In addition to the later trumpets and strings mentioned above, it also originally lacked the boldly imposing slow introduction. There are three different finales, though one is considered spurious. The one given here is a Presto dated 1777. It is believed by some Haydn scholars to have been composed originally for the fourth part of the marionette opera – which were extremely popular at Esterháza – Genovefens, although Robbins Landon is of the opinion that Haydn, responsible for all dramatic performances there, just assembled the music for it. It’s a movement that juxtaposes pomp with an extremely attractive and more lyrical secondary idea.

Those who have investigated this series will need no urging to obtain this latest addition, in which they will find three less familiar symphonies given in performances that happily maintain the extraordinarily high standard established from the first issue in the series. Otherwise, anyone starting here has a great deal of catching up to do!

Brian Robins

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Recording

Monteverdi: Il ritorno d’Ulisse in patria

CD cover Monteverdi Il ritorno d'Ulisse in patria Gonzalez Toro

Christina Fanelli Amore, Lauranne Oliva Giunone, Fortuna, Emőke Baráthe Minerva, Rihab Chaieb Penelope, Alix Le Saux Ericlea, Mathilde Etienne Melanto, Philippe Jaroussky L’Humana fragilità, Anders J Dahlin Pisandro, Philippe Talbot Eumete, Zachery Wilder Telemaco, Emiliano Gonzalez Toro Ulisse, Fulvio Bettini Iro, Álvaro Zambrano Eurimaco, Anthony León Anfinomo, Giove, Nicholas Brooymans Tempo,  Antinoo, Jérôme Varnier Nettuno, I Gemelli, conducted by Emiliano Gonzalez Toro
177:00 (3 CDs)
Gemelli factory GEFA006

Emiliano Gonzalez Toro’s Monteverdi Orfeo won high praise from me when it was released on Naïve in 2020. He has now turned his attention to Il ritorno d’Ulisse in patria, Monteverdi’s penultimate opera, first staged at the Teatro San Giovanni e Paolo in Venice in 1640 to a libretto by Giacomo Badoaro. The set is the first to be issued under the name of the ensemble founded by Gonzalez Toro and artistic director Mathilde Etienne, who is excellent in the role of the lascivious maid Melanto. It is an extraordinarily lavish affair issued in book form, with the English edition consisting of 234 pages printed on high-quality paper. There are no fewer than five major articles including an interview with Etienne and Gonzalez Toro and a highly speculative piece peppered with inaccuracies (San Cassiano, Venice’s first public opera house was not purpose-built for opera but adapted from an existing theatre and so on) on the history of Monteverdi’s operas and their supposed debt to the commedia dell’arte, Orfeo excepted. Nowhere are the considerable doubts that surround the attribution of Il ritorno even mentioned in the interview or the other articles. On a practical level the libretto, the most essential bit of literature for most people, is paradoxically printed in a smaller – and in English lighter – font than the articles, making it difficult to follow.

The lavish presentation seems to be of a part with that devoted to the production itself, which was recorded over a 23-day period, an astonishing amount of time these days. The cast list, too, speaks of generous support for the project, with no fewer than 17 different singers to cover 20 roles. Furthermore, four very brief scenes that were not set by Monteverdi (or any collaborator he may have employed) have been composed especially, that for Nereids and Sirens (act 1, sc 3) being particularly appealing. It might seem, therefore, that the scene is set to report another great success to set alongside the I Gemelli Orfeo. And indeed there are certainly things to commend, but Il ritorno is not Orfeo, which poses relatively few problems to a director if they follow the composer’s beautiful printed score – a rarity for the period – and detailed instructions as to instrumentation. While Orfeo still has slightly more than one foot in the Renaissance, ll ritorno is an unashamedly Baroque opera posing all kinds of problems that need solving by anyone mounting it.

It is the failure to provide satisfactory answers to two of the most important of these questions that to my mind mars this set considerably. The first concerns instrumentation. Gonzalez Toro has gone for a large orchestral body of some 30 players, far exceeding the pair of violins, bass and modest continuo most authorities accept is the norm for mid-century Venetian opera. As Gonzalez Toro makes clear in the interview he is well aware that his orchestra is not historically accurate, rather lamely suggesting that since the first score of the opera to be re-discovered was in Vienna, where the court employed a sizable number of instrumentalists, the work may have been given there. There are in fact two good reasons for the modest scoring of Venetian operas of this period. The first is practical. The explosion of interest in opera in Venice (and subsequently elsewhere) resulted in a number of new opera houses being built in Venice. Invariably they were small and we know from surviving designs and images that the ‘pit’ (often an inverted shell-like structure) would have been incapable of housing more than some half-dozen instruments comfortably. The second is the more important because it concerns the nature of operas of the period, which relied heavily on the heightened recitative or recitar cantando, songs or more lyrical passages being only occasionally introduced. Such writing, as is the case with the later plain recitative that evolved, needs only the support of the continuo bass. To add fuller instrumentation to vocal writing risks obscuring the all-important vocal line. That’s what happens here far too frequently. For a single example from among many go to act 1, sc 5 and 6, where first Neptune is swamped by sackbuts, then Jupiter is drowned out by cornetti not just playing but adding agile improvisation that ensures it is impossible to hear what the god is singing. Certainly there is no prima le parole, dopo la musica here and it is surprising to find a musician with Gonzalez Toro’s experience with this repertoire making such a fundamental error.

Equally as surprising is that he chose for the critical role of Penelope – Ulisse’s long-suffering wife – a singer who had never previously performed Baroque repertoire. Rihab Chaieb is a young Tunisian-Canadian mezzo who has been making waves in later repertoire – go to YouTube and listen to her beautiful, glowing voice soaring in Richard Strauss. But the casting experiment fails disastrously. Much of the role lies just under what I would guess to be the ‘break’ in her voice, where there is little colour and none of the dramatic personality the role requires. Both in the opening monologue and the final reconciliation with her husband, this Penelope misses point after point and is not within hailing distance of the superlative performance by Lucile Richardot in the Versailles set under Stéphane Fuget, a set I have described elsewhere as setting new standards of performance for this repertoire.

Let’s turn to what is good. The set is directed by Gonzalez Toro with a keen awareness of tactus, which means he obtains a fluent flow with plenty of scope for flexibility within the beat. To hear this at its best, listen to Ulisse’s opening monologue (act 1, sc 7), where the warrior awakes, finding himself on a beach after the Phaeacians are shipwrecked. Here the stream of thought and reaction is brilliantly echoed through the constant screwing up and subsequent release of tension. Throughout the tenor’s singing and portrayal of the role is as outstanding as his Orfeo; if less spectacular than that achievement that is only because the role itself is.

It is not my intention to minutely detail every singer’s performance, not least because some of the singing is more than acceptable without being especially notable. This is no doubt because of the director’s declared belief that additional ornamentation to that already provided by Monteverdi is not required. Given the poor articulation of some of what there is, he may be right, but it contributes to some rather featureless performances. Among those that are certainly not featureless are the bright, lively Minerva of Emőke Baráth, the Antinoo and Tempo (Time) of Nicolas Brooymans, the Anfinomo and Giove of Anthony León and the ripely comic Iro (which is a true commedia nell’arte) of Fulvio Bettini). Also commendable is the splendid madrigalian singing of the suitors in their trios of act 2, sc 13 and the choral passages generally.

So much has gone into the making of this set that it seems churlish to conclude by reiterating that it is flawed by what are in my view two serious errors of judgment. Admirers of Gonzalez Toro (of whom I count myself as one) will certainly wish to hear it, but for a general recommendation the recording cannot compete with that of Fuget.

Brian Robins

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Charpentier: Te Deum

La Chapelle Harmonique Charpentier Te Deum

La Chapelle Harmonique, conducted by Valentin Tournet
64:31
Versailles CVS098

In the time of Charpentier the text of the Te Deum was particularly associated with giving thanks to God for victory on the battlefield. Within this context, Marc-Antoine Charpentier composed four settings, of which the present example, H 146, is much the best known and for reasons that extend beyond the use for many years of its instrumental prelude as a flagship theme for major Eurovision transmissions. Charpentier expert Catherine Cessac suggests that H 146 may date from 1692 and the victory of Marshall  Luxembourg at Steenkerque.

Like all such works, the Te Deum’s principal mood is by definition celebratory, enhanced here by the inclusion of trumpets and timpani. But there are, too, more reflective moments of contrast. ‘Te per orbem’, for example, is wonderfully expressive, originally in the hands of outstanding tenor Mathias Vidal, then as a trio involving the addition of haute-contre David Tricou and bass Geoffroy Buffière, the gradual addition of soloists to form an ensemble being a favourite device of Charpentier’s. The succeeding ‘Tu devicto’ for solo soprano is quite ravishingly projected, its long cantabile lines relished with near-sensual delight by Gwendoline Blondeel. Yet ultimately it is the sheer joyous verve with which Valentin Tournet directs the work – and his chorus is magnificent – that sets the seal on a terrific performance.

The opening work on the CD could hardly be more contrasted as to character or performance style. It is a setting of De profundis (H 189), Psalm 129 (or 130 in the Protestant Bible), one of the seven penitential psalms and the psalm set more frequently by Charpentier than any other, a total of no fewer than eight times. H 189 was composed in 1683 on the occasion of the death of Queen Marie-Thérèse. Scored unusually for five-part strings and nine vocal parts, it explores a rich variety of textures and colour. The mood is set at the outset by an orchestral prelude in spacious sentimental style. The breadth and depth carry on into the opening choral setting of the first words ‘De profundis clamavi’, directed by Tournet with quite remarkable concentration. The choral writing here is mostly syllabic homophony, the choir’s cohesion and balance near perfectly sustained. The next number, the deeply expressive ‘Fiant aures tuae’ is initially a soprano solo that brings a new feel to the music, the lyrical lines exquisitely drawn by Blondeel and ultimately by both she and second soprano, Cécile Achille. The final verse, employing words familiar from the Mass for the Dead, ‘Requiem aeternam, dona eis’, rounds off an immensely impressive and profoundly moving work with a return to the breadth of the opening.

The final major work is the Magnificat, H 79, one of ten settings by Charpentier. This one is modestly scored for four vocal parts and four-part strings with a pair of flutes and is dated by Cessac as 1692 or 3. The opening verses are set with a lively sense of the praise they involve, evoking an infectious exuberance. Later contrast comes with more reflective verses such as ‘Suscepit Israel’ an haute-contre solo exquisitely sung by Tricou. But it is the joyous spirit that prevails, the Gloria bursting in to thrust aside the more thoughtful words that precede it and end the work by returning to the elation of the opening.

Finally the Magnificat and Te Deum are separated by four short ceremonial pieces for brass and timpani, the final one for timpani only, by J D Philidor, in some ways an odd idea as it means the prelude to the Te Deum fails to open with quite the startling impact it normally has, its thunder stolen by nearly two preceding minutes of timpani! A quite outstanding addition to the Charpentier discography from one of the rising stars in the already crowded constellation of outstanding French early music musicians.

Brian Robins

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Antico tastame

CD cover Antico tastame Giovan Battiasta Vaglica

Organi storici dell’Arcidiocesi di Monreale
Giovan Battista Vaglica
63:20
Tactus TC 720003

This recording has been a labour of love by Giovan Battista Vaglica who is heavily involved in cataloguing and restoring organs in the Archdiocese of Monreale in Sicily. He plays on three of these instruments here: a 17th-century organ, originally by Antonino La Valle but much altered, in the church of Maria SS. del Carmelo; an anonymous 18th-century instrument in the Chiesa Madre of Terrasini; a 19th-century instrument by an unknown maker in the church of S. Vito in Monreale. The music – all by Sicilian or Neapolitan composers – is well chosen to show off the variety of stops on each of the organs. The two earlier instruments are used for Toccatas by Alessandro Scarlatti and Francesco Durante, as well as a fine fugue by Domenico Scarlatti. A rather over-long set of partite on the Follia di Spagna by the elder Scarlatti provides a good opportunity to put the Terrasini instrument through its paces. The majority of tracks on the recording are played on the Monreale organ, featuring music by Cimarosa, Paisiello and Pergolesi, as well as the lesser-known Neapolitans Pietro Altieri and Fedele Fenaroli. This is all attractive music, without taking itself too seriously, and successfully showcases the surprising variety of timbres available – with only five stops – on the Monreale organ. This recording is a useful reminder of the riches that survive in just one small area of Sicily and the importance of keeping organs such as these in playing condition.

Noel O’Regan

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Bernard Storace In Modo Pastorale

Bernardo Storace in modo pastorale Marouan Mankar-Bennis

Marouan Mankar-Bennis harpsichord & organ
77:00
L’Encelade ECL2101

This is an endearing recording which plunges the listener into a South Italian Christmas via a church bell and a bagpipe-like Pastorale, played on a 1768 Spanish organ by Buenafuente del Sistal (now in the church of Saint-Éloi de Fresnes near Paris). In this and other organ pieces, some subtle – and some not-so-subtle – percussion is added which provides a sense of theatre. Storace described himself as vice-choirmaster to the City of Messina, when publishing his only print in Venice in 1664; otherwise, nothing is known about him. His compositions represent a generic post-Frescobaldi idiom using familiar dance and variation forms: the Ciacona, Follia, Monica, Passacagli, and Ruggiero all feature, as well as as a couple of Recercars and a Toccata-Canzona pairing. One of the Recercars uses the ‘Sancta Maria’ refrain as its starting point, before introducing a chromatic subject and then moving on to a further one, eventually combining all three in what is a very effective piece. The other is entitled ‘di legature’ and was probably intended for the Elevation, though played here on a spinet: it strays into some strange chromatic territory towards the end.

While using familiar genres, Storace proves to be an inventive composer and Mankar-Bennis is a persuasive advocate. He adds a couple of his own short improvisations, on the Bergamasca and the Trombetta/Girometta. As well as the organ, with its blaring Spanish trumpets, he plays on an Italian-style harpsichord by Sean Rawnsley, after Giusti, and an Italian spinet by Jean-François Brun, based on a 1626 instrument. Recording quality is clear throughout and there is a very good variety of tone colours between the three instruments. The recording is sited within a putative grand tour of Sicily by the performer, imagined during the Covid lockdown, taking with him a series of readings by Alexandre Dumas, Guy de Maupassant, and others. Some random short street recordings are added as a preface to many of the tracks; these do add atmosphere, rather than being just a distraction. This may not be to everyone’s taste, but I rather enjoyed the conceit. Full texts are given in the booklet (and online), though only in French, with just a short summary in English. This is an imaginative approach to the music of a neglected composer and making it more accessible.

Noel O’Regan

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Winged Hands

Francesco Corti Winged Hands Handel 8 Great Suites

Handel: The Eight Great Suites & Overtures
Francesco Corti harpsichord
147:00 (2 CDs in a card triptych)
Arcana A499

The title of this collection refers to a comment by Cardinal Benedetto Pamphili, Roman patron of the young Handel, who is reputed to have said: ‘he has wings in his right hand, indeed with that hand he does works that are more than mortal’. This has been taken as praise of Handel’s virtuosity at the keyboard, though Pamphili might also have been referring to the young composer’s expressive ability. Both traits are on full display in this fine recording by Francesco Corti. He is a player of great fluency, with a deep understanding of the styles of the period; he also shows an exceptional talent for idiomatic ornamentation. Sometimes he gets a bit carried away and I find the Gigues a bit rushed and breathless. But when the tempo is right, as it is for most of these movements, there is time for breath without ever losing the sense of the line. His right hand does indeed take flight, slightly behind the left in slower movements, and with good use of agogic accents and a fluid application of notes inégales. There is a real sense here of the impact the young Handel’s playing must have had on his listeners, a long way from other, more literal and careful, recordings of this repertoire. Played in this way, Handel’s music covers a very wide gamut of emotions and styles. I particularly liked his treatment of the introspective F minor Suite (HWV433), but all the suites have their highlights. Registration is imaginative and the harpsichord – by Andrea Restelli after Christian Vater’s Hannover 1738 original – is very well suited to this music. The recording is quite reverberant and more distant than some, mimicking a large public room rather than a smaller one. As well as the eight Suites there are arrangements of opera overtures and other movements from Radamisto, Rinaldo, Rodelinda and Teseo by Handel and William Babell. While excitingly played, I found these rather less satisfactory and often rushed. The Menuet from Rinaldo, for instance, lacks the poise and elegance which David Vickers points to in his excellent sleeve notes. That apart, this is very welcome recording indeed and can be very highly recommended.

Noel O’Regan

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Handel: 8 Great Suites for harpsichord

Asako Ogawa Handel 8 Great Suites Handel

Asako Ogawa
135:32 (2 CDs in a card triptych)
First Hand Records FHR142

Coming in the wake of Francesco Corti’s recent recording of this repertoire, Ogawa’s CD inevitably invites comparison, and I am pleased to report that her playing stands up very well. While not by any means eschewing flamboyance, Ogawa is more sparing in her displays and concentrates on lucidity of sound and clarity of voice leading, with a subtle use of ornamentation. She is reflective in slower movements and exciting in faster ones like the Courantes and Gigues, while retaining a sense of poise. Occasionally, some stodginess creeps into her use of notes inégales, particularly in the Allemandes. As well as the eight Suites, she includes the Chaconne in G major, HWV 435, where effective registration and a strong sense of momentum keeps the music alive throughout. Climaxes in this and other pieces are built steadily, for instance in the so-called ‘Harmonious Blacksmith’ variations in HWV 430: this builds inexorably to a thrilling ending, with Ogawa giving us an extra repeat of the final section where she metaphorically pulls out all the stops. Her reading of the G minor Suite HWV 432 particularly impressed me. She plays on a harpsichord by Klaus Ahrend 1973, based on a model by Dulken, with a beautifully mellow sound; it is quite closely miked, but with just enough reverberation for beauty of tone and clarity. Ivan Moody manages to cram lots of relevant information into his liner notes. Overall, this recording is a considerable achievement and can be recommended for many gratifying insights.

Noel O’Regan

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Sturm und Drang 3

Mozartists Sturm und Drang 3 Ian Page

The Mozartists, conducted by Ian Page
72:59
Signum SIGCD759

This is the eagerly anticipated third volume in what is planned as a seven-disc series of so-called ‘Sturm und Drang’ (storm and stress) works. Applied to music, as previously noted, it’s a slippery concept that takes its origination from the literary genre of that name, a movement typified by Goethe’s Sorrows of Young Werther (1774) and driven by the expression of fierce, sometimes uncontrollable passions. A forerunner of 19th-century Romanticism, it is applied notably to literary works from the early 1770s until c.1790.

The most common usage of the term in music is to a group of stormy, dramatic symphonies composed by Haydn from the mid-1760s to around a decade later, the present ongoing series having to date featured three of them: No. 39 in G minor (1765) on vol 2; No 49 in F minor ‘La Passione’ (1768) on vol 1, and No 44 in E minor ‘Trauer’ (c.1771), which is included on the present CD. It’s a work Ian Page describes as the greatest of the composer’s ‘Sturm und Drang’ symphonies, while I, throwing caution to the wind, would describe it as one of the greatest of all his symphonies. It will be noted that these works are in a minor key, one of the main characteristics of ‘Sturm und Drang’ compositions, and also that two of them pre-date the literary movement, making it difficult to tie them into any suggestion of a defined ‘Sturm und Drang’ movement. As Ian Page suggests in his general note on the topic included, another and more tenable explanation is that it is a reaction against the Rococo charm of the mid-century.

All four movements of the ‘Trauer’ symphony are outstanding, but it is arguably on the magnificent Adagio, placed as the third rather than second movement, that the symphony’s particular claim to exceptional quality lies. Employing muted strings throughout, it threads a path of utmost tranquillity disturbed only by momentary restlessness in the second half. It is supremely well played here with a sense of rapt beauty that further enhances it, as does the contrast with the fiercely uncompromising outer movements. By coincidence, the other symphony here also includes a remarkable slow movement with muted strings. This is the three-movement Symphony in G minor by the Bohemian composer Leopold Kozeluch (1747-1818), the last of a group of three published in 1787. Kozeluch was well-established in Vienna by the time Mozart arrived there in 1781 and in 1785 founded his own publishing house in the city. The outer movements of the G minor Symphony are splendid examples of ‘Sturm und Drang’, typical of the angst, tension, buzzing tremolandi and angularity familiar from the symphonies of Haydn and Mozart (and J C Bach in vol 2) in that key. The central Adagio, however, is a sublime movement, with some particularly felicitous writing; the whole movement sounds as if it is an anticipation of Così fan tutte. The final orchestral work on the disc is Mozart’s Adagio and Fugue for strings, K 546, two movements composed some while apart, with the new, deeply, almost spiritual Adagio composed in 1788 prefacing a fiercely inexorable fugue orchestrated from an earlier fugue for two pianos. The work as a whole is a Janus-like composition with the Adagio anticipating Romantic expressivity, the Fugue looking firmly back over its shoulder to the Baroque. It is projected with great depth and body by the strings of The Mozartists.

Another special feature of the series is the inclusion of vocal, mainly operatic, extracts. Vol 1 is especially valuable in this respect, including first recordings of arias by badly neglected composers such as Jommelli and Traetta, in addition to Gluck, all splendidly sung by Chiara Skerath.

I don’t feel the vocal contribution here to be as strong, either as to content or performance. The US soprano Emily Pogorelc is typical of the current vogue for singers that essay a wide range of repertoire rather than specialise in earlier music. She has a significant continuous vibrato – listen for example to the lovely cavatina that bridges the two stretches of accompanied recitative in Paisiello’s scena for Adrane from Annibale in Torino (Turin, 1771) – and there is a distinct lack of control in the upper range, especially in coloratura. The voice itself has a lustrous quality that brings its rewards, but I feel these are more likely to be appreciated in a later repertoire. The other, and to my mind, superior, vocal excerpt comes from Anton Schweitzer’s Alceste (Weimar, 1773). The opera is notable for having a German libretto by no less celebrated a writer than Wieland, though the music is thoroughly Italianate. Alceste’s  ‘Er ist gekommen … Zwischen Angst’ opens the opera in full dramatic flood, as the queen awaits news of her husband Admetus’s impending death. Pogorelc captures the drama well, but again too much of her singing is blustery and lacking control.

Overall, however, this makes for another exceptionally satisfying addition to a series that is special not just for the thought and scholarship that goes into it, but Page’s direction of his fine players. It is throughout beautifully balanced and paced, while at the same time musically highly insightful.

Brian Robins

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John Sheppard: Missa Cantate

CD cover Sheppard Missa Cantate Tallis Scholars

+ Laudem dicite; Jesu salvator saeculi, redemptis; Martyr Dei qui unicum; Gaude, gaude, gaude Maria; Beata nobis gaudia; Gaude virgo Christiphera

The Tallis Scholars conducted by Peter Phillips
76:22
Gimell CDGIM 053

Peter Phillips has done remarkable work with The Tallis Scholars (TTS), the choir he founded in 1973, recording, performing, broadcasting, editing, writing about and generally evangelizing for British (sic – Tomkins, though no Carver) and European music of the Renaissance. The standard of performance has always been high, sometimes transcendent – Josquin’s Missa Pange lingua, Sheppard’s Media vita and from left field the Agnus of Missa Da pacem by Bauldeweyn misattributed to Josquin, to name only a few at random. The choir’s personnel never stagnate, and nor therefore do their performances. This is illustrated by a concert which I recall attending in December 2014 at St John’s Smith Square, during which TTS sang the exhilarating but unfamiliar Magnificat by Edmund Turges, and the familiar Lullaby by Byrd which nonetheless received a revelatory rendition.

With their pinpoint tuning and use of high pitch, TTS have an ideal composer in Sheppard, with his thrilling melodies, enthralling counterpoint, spicy harmonies and startling dissonances. The works selected for this recording each contain all of the above. Every piece was intended for the Roman Catholic liturgy that passed into obsolescence in England almost simultaneously with the death of Sheppard himself. The mass, which is for six voices, runs for nearly half an hour on this recording, and two of the motets, Gaude, gaude, gaude Maria and Gaude virgo Christiphera, take over ten minutes, while all the others except Martyr Dei qui unicum take over five, all giving Sheppard ample scope for exhibiting his unique and remarkable style.

There are five other current recordings of this Mass, and while two of these are by other adult chamber choirs, the other three are by cathedral or collegiate choirs of men plus boys (and, in one case, boys and girls): The Choir of Westminster Cathedral; St Mary’s Scottish Episcopal Cathedral, Edinburgh; and the trebles of Salisbury Cathedral joined by the lower voices of the Gabrieli Consort, most of whom will have had ecclesiastical backgrounds. This version by The Tallis Scholars (many of whom also have ecclesiastical backgrounds) sounds the most secular of all these. It seems in places to come over as quite assertively accented, either on the beat in the Mass, or corresponding with changes of notes in the plainsong in works which are built around the chant in one of the voices. The versions sung by the ecclesiastical choirs seem to have more of an ethereal flow, appropriate to the acoustics of the buildings in which Sheppard’s works would be sung liturgically, while The Tallis Scholars’ interpretation is ideal for the sort of drier acoustic usually encountered in secular concert halls. This is the reality of the modern world: fabulous early liturgical music being rediscovered, cherished, and performed democratically, for mental and spiritual refreshment and delectation, as well as for sheer listening pleasure, outwith the sacred environment for which it was originally intended. Ironically in view of what I have just written, The Tallis Scholars made this recording in Brinkburn Priory, but it still comes across to this listener as an interpretation suited for the likes of Cadogan Hall. This in no way is any sort of denigration of a fine recording, expertly sung, which contains consistently wonderful music, sometimes achieving sublimity as in the case of the increasingly famous Amen to Jesu salvator saeculi, redemptis.

Three of Sheppard’s other four surviving masses (all a4) – Plainsong Mass for a Mean, Western Wind and Be not afraid – are available on commercial recordings, so it would be good to have the French Mass on CD etc. to complete the set, and to enable the listening public to hear more of this great composer’s music.

Richard Turbet