Tag: Baroque

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Recording

The Seasons

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Prisma
58:31
Ambronay AMY311
Castello, Marini, Merula, Uccellini, etc.

Rather disorientatingly, two of the four seasonal sections of this programme begin with decidedly 21st-century preludes on recorder and violin respectively, which to my mind add nothing musically to the programme of otherwise 16th- and 17th-century Italian instrumental works – hard to imagine who thought this was a good idea. The witty mosquito imitations of the violin prelude and the lute homage to Yves Montand, shoe-horned into the Autumn selection would probably be well received in a concert but don’t really belong on a serious CD. However, even once we are safely into the real subject of the CD where the choice of repertoire is impeccable and fascinating, and the playing is wonderfully idiomatic, we are still occasionally dropped into episodes ‘arranged’ by the group members, where the early music is forced through a prism of modern textures. I found this approach self-indulgent and annoying, as well as slightly patronizing to the original composers – why bother to learn to play period instruments in an idiomatically authentic manner, only to randomly present some of the music in a context in which it could never have been conceived by its composers? This is a huge pity as most of the repertoire is beautifully and imaginatively presented, and there is fine music here which has rarely been heard before. Isn’t that enough, without cheap gimmicks?

D. James Ross

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Recording

Caldara: Brutus

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Cantatas for bass
Sergio Foresti, Stile Galante, directed by Stefano Aresi
66:22
Pan Classics PC10389

Solo chamber cantatas for bass voice are extremely unusual, the genre being one overwhelmingly dominated by either the soprano or alto voice. I suppose if any composer was going to have devoted himself to them, the prolific Antonio Caldara would be a good bet since his vast catalogue of compositions includes around 350 secular cantatas. Further, as the notes for the present CD suggest, there is another probable explanation for Caldara’s secular bass cantatas and it is one that helps date them. From 1716 to 1736 the composer was in the employment of Emperor Charles VI at the Habsburg court in Vienna, a musical ruler with a particular penchant for the bass voice.

It therefore seems almost certain that the six cantatas recorded here for the first time were composed during Caldara’s Viennese years, a claim supported by the fact that the only one that can be positively dated, Il Dario, belongs to 1727. Although not mentioned in Pan’s notes, it is my belief that such strong circumstantial evidence takes on even greater credibility when the identity of the singer for whom the cantatas were written can be established with near certainty. This was Christoph Praun (or Braun), who took the serious bass roles in the operas of composers such as Caldara and Conti staged at the Imperial court between 1718 and 1732. Evidence that these cantatas were written for Praun is further enhanced by comparing the style of them with the two arias written for him in the role of Saturna in Caldara’s serenata La Concordia de’ pianeti of 1723. Here we find the same virtuoso demands that predominate in the cantatas: a wide tessitura involving frequent leaps requiring great flexibility, coupled with demanding chains of passaggi, characteristics that suggest a singer with a not inconsiderable technique.

Bass roles in the operas of this period were usually given to villains, military men or those of commanding character, so it is little surprise to find that the protagonists of these cantatas include Brutus, Polyphemus, Samson, and Darius, the Persian king defeated by Alexander the Great. The remaining two cantatas conform to the more familiar pastoral tradition. All are scored with continuo accompaniment (here cello, theorbo and harpsichord) and take the customary form of alternating recitative and aria, though ‘A destar l’alba col canto’ (one of the pastoral cantatas) and Il Dario both open with an aria, The latter seems to me the finest of these works, Caldara capturing Darius’ grief at the supposed loss of his wife in an opening aria of real depth and tragic mien, the desolation articulated in powerfully expressive chromatic writing. An extended central recitative calls poignantly on the gods to relieve Darius of his suffering, while the final aria is a heartfelt plea to the shade of his beloved wife to return, its poignancy again stressed by chromaticism. Nothing else quite reaches this level, though the dignity of the blind Samson’s first aria ‘Di quest’occhi è spento il lume’ certainly deserves special mention.

Although Sergio Foresti brings considerable insight to interpreting these cantatas, with much expression and a keen awareness of text, I doubt that his performances will be much to the taste of readers of a specialist platform such as EMR. Though the voice projects authority, there is a persistent wide vibrato that for early music listeners is likely to consistently detract from the virtues of the performances. This along with woolly, approximate articulation of ornaments and a lack of flexibility in the many demanding passaggi mar the performances seriously, as do the rather too frequent problems Foresti has with pitch. Stile Galante provide unexceptionable support, with the familiar caveat that the theorbist is far too active. An interesting CD that basses might want to explore for the repertoire, but one unlikely to attract too many early music specialists.

Brian Robins

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Recording

Corelli: Concerti Grossi, Sinfonia Santa Beatrice d’Este

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Freiburger Barockorchester, Gottfried von der Goltz
70:36
Aparté AP190

It’s Corelli, but not as we know it! Everyone who knows anything about Baroque music knows that the written note is only the starting point of a performance; singers and players must adorn it in their own style while respecting the composer’s original thoughts. It is equally well known that various writers described how concerti grossi could be embellished (and the harmony made richer) by the doubling of parts and, in certain circumstances, the addition of instruments not specified, such as oboes and bassoons, and “other instruments”.

So, you will know what is coming next. The 66423 strings (more basses than cellos?) are joined by oboes, bassoon, trumpets, trombones, lutes (yes, plural!), harp and one harpsichordist/organist (whose presence you will certainly notice). Anything in D with arpeggio themes is taken over by trumpets (except, obviously enough, in the passages where modulation makes their participation impossible). The two solo violinists “improvise” a very neat introduction to one concerto. It’s all great fun, and a novel way to hear Corelli’s music, but is it HIP? In fact, I would argue that actually the arrangements (because that is what they are) do not go far enough; rather than giving the brass players music and telling them to play whatever they can of a violin part, why not sit down and compose a brass part that is fully participatory – that is, after all, what musicians of the time would have done; the Dresden music collection is full of parts for instruments the composer did not intend which were composed by the copyists according to the style of the court musical establishment – and frequently these parts do not feature in surviving contemporary scores. While I initially warmed to the extra colours in Corelli’s music, ultimately I found the overall result a little disappointing from an intellectual perspective. The playing, as you would imagine, is wonderful!

Brian Clark

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Recording

Heironymus Praetorius: Missa in Festo Sanctissimae Trinitatis

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Volker Jänig (organ), Weser-Renaissance, Manfred Cordes
70:27
cpo 777 954-2

As usual with these performers, this recording is so much more than just a recital. This time, in conjunction with Frederick K. Gable (an Emeritus Professor from California), they offer us some idea of what high mass on Trinity Sunday might have sounded like. But it comes with a caveat: “Since little archival information has survived about singing the mass in Hamburg, it is impossible precisely to determine how these works were performed during Praetorius’s time.” Now that’s what I call a “get out” clause! At its heart is Praetorius’s Missa Benedicam Dominum, whose Credo is replaced by Jacob Praetorius’s setting of its German reincarnation, Wir gläuben all an einen Gott. The programme also includes settings of the introit and offertory for Trinity Sunday, and substitutes for the other mass propers. The tri-partite scheme of the Kyries, the Christe and the Agnus Dei sections are created using chorale and organ versions, giving a range of styles and sounds that probably (in my opinion) was not a feature of period performances, but I think it both valuable and informative to hear the differing approaches. The singing and playing, as always with Cordes, is very finely crafted – with a total of six singers (SSATTB) and seven players (violin, cornetto, viola, two trombones, dulcian and continuo orgen – not played by Volker Jänig!) he creates a rich and warm soundworld. The instrumental substitutions for voices in the larger pieces (as would surely have happened at the time) are judiciously selected, and no one voice is ever allowed to dominate the texture – in other words, this is in many ways an ideal exposition of Hieronymus Praetorius’s church music.

Brian Clark

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Recording

Vivaldi: Il Giustino

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Delphine Galou Giustino, Emőke Baráth Arianna, Silke Gäng Anastasio, Verónica Cangemi Leocasta, Emiliano Gonzalez Toro Vitaliano, Arianna Vendittelli Amanzio, Alessandro Giangrande Andronico (alto) & Polidarte (tenor), Rahel Maas Fortuna, Accademia Bizantina, Ottavio Dantone
No total timing shown (3 CDs in a jewel box with booklet in card sleeve)
Naïve OP 30571

HOW AMAZING to think that naïve’s vivaldi edition has reached volume 58! This is the 17th complete opera to be recorded and – like its predecessors – it is packed with fantastic music. The plot is typically complicated (and its denouement typically contrived) and I must confess that the more baroque opera I listen to the better I understand a friend’s insistence that Handel is quite in a class of his own when it comes to getting under the skins of his characters; it is true that Vivaldi writes happy arias, and sad ones, angry and love-dazed ones, too, but they are two dimensional representations of those emotions – his characters somehow lack personality.

In this well-paced and beautifully recorded set, the singing of the arias and ensembles (Arianna and Anastasio sing two gorgeous duetti) is mostly first rate and the playing often outstanding – I especially enjoyed the contributions of the horns. Try as I might to put it out of my mind, though, I could not avoided being irked by the fact that the repeated A sections were not so much ornamented as re-written (occasionally, frankly, beyond the abilities of the singers). Similarly the secco recitative for the most part lack any dynamism and any attempts to liven it up (such as the scene protraying the slaying of the bear) descended into the aural equivalent of ham acting…

So a mixed bag, to be honest. I think I’d probably just programme the player to omit the recit and enjoy a recital of very fine arias.

Brian Clark

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Recording

Hotteterre: Complete Chamber Music Vol. 3

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Camerata Köln
133:51 (2 CDs in a jewel case)
cpo 555 038-2
Suites opp. 4, 5, & 6

I gave warm welcomes to the first two releases of Camerata Köln’s series and I am delighted to say that this is more of the same. The music is delightful and the various scorings (flute + bc, two ‘trebles’ without bass, flute solo, recorder solo, recorder +bc, two gambas, and gamba + bc) keep the ear engaged even when the two discs are played straight through. Other aspects of the performance contribute to this as well, of course. The low pitch (390) produces rich sonorities, the playing is infallibly stylish and the general approach to performance practice is exploratory yet restrained. Thus the ‘recorder’ music is produced by transposing a flute original up a minor third and the ‘gamba’ sonata is a flute original down a perfect fourth. No Baroque musician would have taken exception to this: the transpositions simply involve reading the music in a different clef and imagining a new key signature. The booklet (German/English) is concise but still manages to tell us what we need to know about composer, music and performances. Overall, a most enjoyable package, though I would have welcomed full details of the instruments.

David Hansell

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Recording

Ballet Royal de la Nuit

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Ensemble Correspondances, Sébastien Daucé
196:46 (3 CDs and a DVD in a book)
harmonia mundi musique HMM 902603.606

‘Edition Intégrale et Définitive’ it proclaims, not to mention ‘Deluxe Edition’ and ‘Edition Spéciale – Version Définitive’.

This is an updated expansion – a completion, really – of a project whose first incarnation I reviewed here –https://earlymusicreview.com/le-concert-royal-de-la-nuit/.I haven’t changed my general views.

What has changed is that those dances that were not re-constructed for the 2015 recording have now been added and in 2017 the whole show was lavishly staged and filmed. My struggles with aspects of the musical performance practice extended to the staging, I’m afraid. It’s certainly striking but there’s nothing HIP or even ‘generally in keeping with the period’ about either the choreography or the costumes and I actually thought the rushing around during the overture was rather silly. But I will acknowledge that if you think that a Baroque Spectacular is best staged as a Modern Spectacular you’ll find it thrilling. It’s simply that I found the conflict between what I was seeing and what I was hearing too great. A marvellous show, but perhaps a missed opportunity.

David Hansell

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Recording

Vandini: Sonate per violoncello e continuo

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Bologna Baroque (Antonio Mostacci violoncello piccolo a 5 corde, Antonello Manzo violoncello, Paolo Potì clavicembalo)
56:31
Tactus TC 692202

If – like me – you had never heard of Vandini, please do not feel ashamed; although he was one of the leading cellists of his day (as these six sonatas amply prove) and a close friend and colleague of Tartini (to the extent of the latter living with him after the loss of his wife until his own death in 1770), he remains something of a footnote in musical history books. Which is common territory for Tactus, of course – their valiant crusade to rescue the music of their countrymen and women goes on apace, and this is certainly one of their true successes. Bologna Baroque give excellent performances of five three-movement sonatas and a solitary two-movement work. They were not intended as a set and only one of them seems to be dated (1717, so the composer would have been in his mid 20s); only one is in a minor key. They are all, however, lyrical and technically demanding in equal measure. I listened to the performances initially not realising that Mostacci used a violoncello piccolo and was very impressed by the playing in high registers; the additional top string in no way undermines his achievements, though! The continuo accompaniment is just that, and (in my humble opinion!) just as it should be; I’m growing ever wearier of harpsichordists who go out of their way to draw attention to themselves rather than to enhance the music the composer wrote. But I refuse to end on a negative note – well done, Bologna Baroque! Well done, Tactus!

Brian Clark

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Recording

harmonia mundi boxed sets

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Last minute Christmas gift ideas for fans of HIP performances of early music? Don’t worry – harmonia mundi have stacks of bumper sets that will please everyone.

For medievalists, there is an 11-CD set (!) entitled “Die grossen Minnesänger” (Christophorus CHR 77432, over 11 hours of music) covers recordings from 1985 to 2015 and almost every imaginable top source of music from that period, featruing the ensemble für frühe musik augsburg, Per-Sonat, Ensemble Leones, I Ciarlatani and a solo disc of Konrad von Würzburg’s music by the doyenne of the repertoire, Andrea von Ramm (which also contains PDFs of all of the complete booklets from the other sets).

For lovers of baroque and classical music, Accent have released two awesome boxes called “Sigiswald Kuijken – The Concertos” (10 CDs lasting nearly 11 hours, ACC 24352) and “Sigiswald Kuijken – The Chamber Music” (20 CDs lasting over 19 hours, ACC 24351). The former devotes two discs each to Vivaldi, Telemann and Joseph Haydn, three to Bach and the 10th disc to Mozart, while the latter runs from English Viol Music via Rameau and Couperin, through three discs of Haydn to two more discs of Mozart.

Finally in the HIP selection, opera lovers will be in seventh heaven to discover René Jacobs’ Mozart/Da Ponte set in a single box (HMX 2908801.09, 9 CDs of music lasting a little under nine hours, plus a 10th CD with PDFs of the libretti and translations). Though personally I have never been much of a fan of his recordings, after listening to several alternative new releases over recent months, I found these nicely paced accounts impressive and dramatically engaging. The singers (and again, as far as I am concerned – and I stress that I am not much of an opera fan!) are not “singing down” in the name of being “more authentic”; it struck me more that they were singing as part of a larger ensemble (i. e., the orchestra) than project as stars over it. Bravo to all concerned.

Brian Clark

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Sheet music

François Couperin: Pièces d’Orgue

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Edited by Jon Baxendale
184 pp (hardback)
Cantando Musikkforlag
ISMN: 979-0-2612-4441-1

It has always frustrated me that past generations of editors have thought it just fine to publish music in non-specialist, mass-distribution editions in a form that is not fully suitable for performance. I am thinking in particular of renaissance music that lacks any indication that a plainchant incipit or insertion is needed and liturgical organ music that gives no hint of the chant that should surround it.

Well, at long last this latter issue has been addressed, at least for Couperin, by this handsome new edition of his two organ masses which may prove to be the most enduring memorial to have been stimulated by the composer’s 350th anniversary year – it has already been used for three recordings. An editorial re-consideration of the masses was long overdue. Their sources are complicated by the fact that the music, though ‘published’ by the composer, was never actually engraved and printed: what you bought was a printed title page but a manuscript copy of the notes themselves. In a spectacular piece of diligent research Jon Baxendale has carefully explored the whole musico-social-historical-commercial context of the surviving copies and their relationship to others that must once have existed and proposed a new and convincing stemma on which to base his work.

Indeed, what this publication contains in addition to the music is at least as important as it is. The lengthy introduction explores Couperin’s early life as an organist and the sources of the music; offers advice on performance style and ornamentation; and explains that this music is in the alternatim tradition, in which organ music replaces portions of the sung liturgical texts. Not only are the necessary chants and texts to complete the mass ordinary provided but there is also a set of propers. Needless to say, all the chant is from appropriate French sources. In addition, there is an explanation of the organs on which the repertoire was originally played, discussion of exactly which stops were used for what, and comments from other contemporary organists/composers – since we have none from Couperin himself – on the general character of each movement style. All these are evaluated and explained further, where this is needed, by the editor. The volume ends with a substantial critical commentary and a valuable bibliography.

As an organist myself, I value the edition’s landscape format, the clarity of the print and its relatively spacious layout which leaves space for the insertion of fingering! I do, however, regret that the margin on the binding edge is not a little more generous in order to provide easier reading of those parts of the pages. However, above all I value Couperin’s music, of which we now have a newly-authoritative edition we can use with re-booted confidence and understanding – an edition underpinned by no little editorial knowledge, skill and sheer love.

I honestly think that this is the publication that those who play the French Baroque organ repertoire have been needing for decades.

David Hansell

I declare an interest in that I did see and comment on an early version of the edition but I did none of – and claim no credit for any of – the research and do not benefit financially from sales!