Caccini – L’Euridice
Soloists; Concerto Italiano; Rinaldo Alessandrini
Naïve OP 30552

In 1607 Carlo Magno wrote to his brother that there would soon be a performance of “a piece that will be unique because all the performers speak musically.” The piece was Monteverdi’s Orfeo and the letter clearly shows that a work that was sung throughout or, as we would call it, an opera, was felt to be a new thing. The earliest opera was Jacopo Peri’s Dafne (1597 or 1598) but, since the music for that work has not survived, opera is generally thought to begin with the two Eurydice operas (written to the same libretto) by Peri and Giulio Caccini, both of which date from 1600. Musicologists have usually dismissed the Caccini version. On the other hand, the printed material that comes with an earlier recording of the Caccini (conducted by Nicholas Achten, on the Ricercar label) claims that Caccini, not Peri, was the true founder of the new genre.

The musical language of Caccini’s opera, the stile rappresentativo, is based on the impassioned speech of the solo voice. It is more melodious than mere recitative but it never develops into aria. Nor does it have the musical inventiveness or instrumental variety that characterize Monteverdi’s opera only a few years later. Whether or not the Caccini is inferior to Peri’s version, it has a great deal of dramatic power and is certainly worth listening to, especially when it is sung and played as well as it is here. Rinaldo Alessandrini and the Concerto Italiano have given us many fine recordings, particularly of the Monteverdi Madrigals, and this CD does not disappoint.

Leclair – Complete Sonatas for Two Violins
Greg Ewer; Adam Lamotte
Sono Luminus DSL-92176
(sonoluminus.com)

This two-CD set does indeed include all 12 violin duos by the French violin virtuoso Jean-Marie Leclair, six each in his Opp.3 and 12 collections. Leclair’s compositional brilliance is in marrying Italian and French styles with endlessly interesting and entertaining results. A dancer in his younger life, Leclair has an innate sense of dance rhythms and even the most ferocious of his allegro movements possesses grace, elegance and warmth. His writing for two violins, in particular, makes full use of the sonic possibilities of each instrument. Each part has equal prominence and there is an intricate relationship of soloistic and accompaniament duty-sharing as one finds in the gamba duos of Marais from a generation before. Along with Leclair’s sonatas and concertos, these duos deserve wider recognition and more frequent performance.

Ewer and Lamotte display an obvious fondness for this repertoire and take great care to bring out the expressiveness and line in each of these delightful sonatas. My one minor wish is that they might have occasionally made a more extreme tempo choice, either on the fast or slow side of the equation. That being said, their performances are poised, elegant and full of colour, contrast and life. It was a pleasant surprise to read the informative program notes by Montreal’s Matthias Maute.

Telemann – Miriways
Markus Volpert; Ulrika Hofbauer; L’Orfeo Barockorchester; Michi Gaigg
CPO 777 752-2

The Opera House in Hamburg, the first public opera house in the German-speaking world, opened in 1678. The operas it staged were in German, although they sometimes included Italian arias. Initially the major composer was Reinhold Keiser; later younger composers like Handel and Johann Mattheson gained their start in Hamburg. Telemann settled in Hamburg in 1721. He soon became the director of the company and wrote many operas for it. Most Hamburg operas dealt with mythology or ancient history but occasionally more topical subjects were introduced: Keiser wrote Masaniello Furioso in 1706; its subject was the 1647 Neapolitan revolt against the Spanish rulers of the city. Mattheson wrote an opera about Boris Godunov in 1710. Telemann’s 1728 Miriways was more topical than either. Its main character is a Pashtun emir from Kandahar, who, supposedly, defeated the Persians and conquered Isfahan in 1709.

Although the opera is in German, it is based on the Italian opera seria pattern with elaborate da capo arias. There is some interesting experimentation: in the first act the Persian Nisibis sings an aria, in which she invokes sleep, and appropriately falls asleep in the middle, in the B section, on the dominant! An oriental colouring is provided by the brilliant and taxing parts for the corni da caccia. In this performance recorded live in Theatre Magdeburg the opera is well sung and well played. Magdeburg was Telemann’s home town and the Magdeburg theatre is committed to performing all his works. Telemann’s operas are not well known and this lively (and live) performance can be wholeheartedly welcomed.

Handel – Tamerlano
Xavier Sabata; Max Emanuel Cenčić; John Mark Ainsley; Karina Gauvin; Ruxandra Donose; Pavel Kudinov; Il Pomo D’Oro; Riccardo Minasi
Naïve V 5373

The story of Tamerlano, or Timur the Lame, and his victory over the Ottoman sultan Bajazet provided perfect fodder for the operas of Baroque’s greatest masters (Handel and Vivaldi), as well as a slew of lesser composers, Gasparini amongst them. The peasant who rose to rule most of Asia, from Anatolia to northern India, and claimed to be a descendant of Genghis Khan, was essentially a 15th-century version of Alexander the Great. His defeat of the Ottoman Empire offered Europe a 50-year breather from a war on its eastern flank. His imprisonment and killing of Bajazet was already being used in Great Britain as a political metaphor for the struggle against the house of Stuart and plays on the theme were staged in early November of each year before Handel wrote his opera. In 1724, at its premiere, Tamerlano was joined by two other plays on the subject. It proved to be one of Handel’s great successes, in no small part because of numerous, brilliant arias and the dramatic tension of Bajazet’s suicide. In this recording, as in most if not all Naïve productions (the label is famous for recording all of the works by Vivaldi), the playing is meticulous and the voices… The voices are, to be frank, fantastic! If we only had such an ensemble in the recent COC production of Hercules! Karina Gauvin astounds with her ongoing vocal development, and Sabata and Cenčić are both delightful discoveries for this reviewer. Bravi!

Bach – Six Partitas from Clavier-Übung I (1731)
Rafael Puyana
SanCtuS SCS-027-028-029 (sanctusrecordings.com)

Lavish is an understatement when it comes to describing the cover and booklet for this interpretation by the late Rafael Puyana of these six partitas. They are a tribute to a breathtaking odyssey in which Puyana’s teacher Wanda Landowska first saw the three-manual harpsichord used in this recording – back in 1900. The instrument was acquired and painstakingly restored by Puyana, but not until 2013 was his 1985 recording made public on these CDs.

 The very first Praeludium and Allemande indicate the joy and pleasure that Bach discovered when composing the partitas. Indeed, the rural background of the allemandes, courantes and sarabandes found in each of the partitas show how important this provenance was for Bach. This light quality is shared by the writer of the sleeve notes regarding the allemande: “If it is treated as being in quadruple time, the player is obliged to take it more slowly, the end result being frankly soporific. Many contemporary harpsichordists have bored us to death through over-literal interpretations…” No such anxieties here; listen to the gushing quality of the Giga or the Sinfonia which opens Partita II, not to mention the heavenly quality of the latter’s Sarabande. Its concluding Capriccio is “technically fiendish to master.”

 Partita III demonstrates both the speed of the Corrente [sic] and the slow, stately Sarabande which immediately follows it in total contrast. The three last movements (Burlesca, Scherzo, Gigue) return the listener to the demanding complexity of Bach’s composition.

 Particularly testing (even in comparison with other partitas) is the overture to Partita IV, with its almost glissando effects. Everything else is sedate by comparison until the concluding Gigue places its own demands on Puyana’s skills. Partita V is far more spirited, as Praeludium, Gigue and Corrente contrast with the slower Sarabande.

 And finally Partita VI, starting with the only Toccata in the collection, which culminates in a complex and varied set of sequences. The subsequent movements are light but expressive. All in all, the comment in the notes is absolutely correct: Bach’s six partitas were unprecedented in their virtuosity, length and intensity. They amazed contemporary harpsichordists.

 Soporific and bored to death? Not with Rafael Puyana’s interpretations.

In Translation – Selections from JS Bach’s Cello Suites
Amy Porter
Equilibrium EQ 124 (equilibri.com)

What an audacious undertaking, to record J.S. Bach’s cello suites played on the flute. Despite all we hear about composers of the Baroque era encouraging musicians to play their works on instruments other than the ones for which they were written, these suites seem made for the cello, and are indelibly associated with it, particularly because of their introduction to mainstream music-making in the 20th century by the legendary cellist, Pablo Casals. Since Casals, every cellist able to play them, including Rostropovich, Yo-Yo Ma and a host of others have performed and recorded them.

Outrageous as the undertaking may seem, Amy Porter almost pulls it off: she plays the Prelude of Suite 1, the Sarabande of Suite 2 and the Prelude and Sarabande of Suite 4 with an effortless, ethereal and contemplative serenity, which to me works as well as any number of interpretations by cellists. Her technical brilliance in the Prelude of Suite 6 is striking, especially because she carries her virtuosity lightly; it’s just what she does – no big deal.

Where things don’t go so well is in the dances – the allemandes, courantes and gigues. Rostropovich plays these like dances, with great energy, vitality and forward motion. This is what Porter doesn’t do. She stays in a contemplative frame of mind: when the music is crying out for dynamic physicality it becomes static. While the more contemplative movements are often exquisite, the rest is dragged down by dances that don’t dance.

Vierne – String Quartet; Pierné – Piano Quintet
Goldner String Quartet; Piers Lane
Hyperion CDA68036

The Goldner Quartet from Australia should be better known. Dene Olding and Dimity Hall, violins, Irina Morozova, viola, and Julian Smiles, cello, are brilliant in these seldom-heard works. YouTube footage shows the near-blind Louis Vierne (1870-1937) playing the organ, erect and with head completely still, as though totally wrapped up in a vision of the music that streams forth effortlessly from minimal finger and foot motions. His String Quartet in D minor, Op.12 (1894) similarly seems a natural and complete mental conception from the young composer. Everything happens at just the right time. The Goldner Quartet brings it off confidently, with impeccable ensemble in the delightful Intermezzo and deep feeling in the Andante.

Gabriel Pierné (1863-1937) was a Paris conductor-composer who led the Colonne Orchestra in important premieres of compositions by Stravinsky, Ravel and Debussy. Playing his sprawling late-Romantic Piano Quintet in E minor, Op.41 (1916), the Goldners do their best along with Australian pianist Piers Lane. This is a remarkable work but, despite harmonic inventiveness, the composer’s obsessive repetition of rhythmic patterns in the first movement becomes troubling. The second movement features absolutely charming handling of the zortzico, a Basque dance in 5/8 time. Yet the many repetitions of the tune, re-harmonized using almost every move in the late-19th-century toolkit, were more than I could take. To be sure, the work has some fine mystical moments and Lane is a true virtuoso in the last movement’s near-crazy ending!

Impressions of France
Caroline Léonardelli
CEN Classics CEN1453
(carolineleonardelli.com)  

Ottawa-based harpist Caroline Léonardelli presents an attractive selection of late 19th- and early 20th-century harp music by Paris Conservatory-educated composers. Her previous recording El Dorado received a JUNO Award nomination. Beyond technical proficiency and adherence to the French school of her teachers, it is her artistic sense of pacing and of shaping melodies within cascades of notes that help make these performances commanding. Léonardelli captures both the sense of a wonder-filled fairy tale in Marcel Grandjany’s impressionist Dans la forêt du charme et de l’enchantement, and the moods of meditation and exaltation in his Gregorian chant-inspired Rhapsodie. Grandjany’s teacher was the less-well-known Henriette Renié, who deservedly receives recognition here with the premiere recording of her challenging, aptly conceived Ballade No.2.

One of Léonardelli’s intentions for this disc is to honour the long French harp tradition, involving interaction between teachers, students, composers, performers and manufacturers. The disc opens with the Étude in E-Flat Minor by harp virtuoso Felix Godefroid, who helped the Érard Company improve the double-action harp, followed by the Pièce de concert, Op.32 by centenarian Henri Büsser (1872-1973!), written for Renié’s teacher Alphonse Hasselmans. There are also intriguing works by more familiar composers Saint-Saëns, Roussel and Ibert. I found Roussel’s ingeniously chromatic Impromptu, Op.21 especially heartfelt, and Léonardelli’s personal association with its dedicatee Lily Laskine makes this recording particularly valuable.

Violinist Lynn Kuo and pianist Marianna Humetska have been playing as a duo since 2006, but Love: Innocence, Passion, Obsession is their self-issued debut CD (LKCD0001
lynnkuo.com). It’s promoted as “a musical exploration of love, from the sparks of passion to the throes of jealousy and heartbreak,” but I’m not sure if the recital program really lives up to it.

The main work on the CD is the always-popular César Franck Sonata in A Major, which is given a solid performance highlighted by Humetska’s expansive and passionate keyboard work. Astor Piazzolla’s Milonga en re is a short, haunting piece given a sensitive, tender reading here. Michael Pepa’s Fantaisie bohémienne lives up to its title, giving Kuo the opportunity to shine and to display a wide range of technical skills in a bravura, almost improvisatory gypsy-flavoured fantasia. Nino Rota’s Improvviso en re minore is another short but passionate offering.

The final track is the Concert Fantasy on Themes from Gershwin’s Porgy and Bess, Op.19 by the Russian violin virtuoso Igor Frolov, who died just last summer. It’s a colourful portrait that captures the range and passion of one of Gershwin’s most popular works, and gives Humetska in particular the chance once again to display the full power of her technical and interpretive skills. Recorded in CBC Studio 211 in Toronto, the balance and sound quality are excellent.

Unfortunately, there is no accompanying booklet: full notes are promised by visiting Kuo’s web site, but at the moment there’s nothing there about the works on the CD.

The Montreal-born violinist Frédéric Bednarz is joined by his wife, pianist Natsuki Hiratsuka, in a CD of Sonatas for violin and piano by Szymanowski and Shostakovich (Metis Islands Music MIM-0004 metis-islands.com). Karol Szymanowski’s Sonata in D Minor, Op.9, is an early work from 1904; it’s a traditional late-Romantic piece with more than a passing reference to the Franck sonata, and is given a clear, thoughtful reading by both players.

The Shostakovich Sonata Op.134 is, by contrast, a late work, written in 1968 for David Oistrakh’s 60th birthday; as with so much late Shostakovich, it never seems to shake that all-pervasive sense of nervous apprehension, desolation and loss of hope. Again, the playing is sensitive and clear, with a particularly effective Largo, the third and final movement which is almost as long as the first two movements put together. There could perhaps be a bit bigger emotional range in places – maybe more of a raw edge at times – but these are beautifully balanced and satisfying performances.

The CD was recorded in McGill University’s Music Multimedia Room in Montreal, where Bednarz is a member of the Molinari String Quartet, the quartet in residence at the Montreal Conservatory.

The English violinist Sara Trickey is joined by her regular duo partner Daniel Tong in an outstanding recital of Schubert Sonatinas for violin and piano on her latest Champs Hill CD (CHRCD080). The Callino Quartet accompanies her in the Rondo in A Major for Violin and Strings, D438.

The sonatinas – D Major D384, A Minor D385 and G Minor D408 – are actually the first three of Schubert’s violin sonatas, and were written in early 1816 when he was 19. They weren’t published until 1836, eight years after Schubert’s death, when Anton Diabelli, who had purchased a large part of Schubert’s musical estate from Schubert’s brother Ferdinand, issued them as Sonatinas by Diabelli, their true identity remaining unknown for many years.

Trickey has known these works for some time – she says they have been “under my skin” ever since she first encountered them at the age of 14 – and it shows. Her foreword to the booklet makes clear that she understands exactly what these sonatas are: she refers to “the joy mixed with frailty, the poignancy and darkness which never quite subsumes a sense of hope” and to the “passing hints of almost everything that is to come.”

Trickey has a beautiful tone; it’s sweet, clear and pure, but never lacks a steely underlying strength when needed. Tong is an equal partner in every respect.

The Rondo, a more challenging work from 1816 presented here in its original form with string quartet, rounds out a simply stunning CD.

Schumann – Waldszenen,  Kinderszenen; Janáček – On an Overgrown Path
Marc-André Hamelin, piano
Hyperion CDA68030

The term “pianistic supernova” is not one that music reviewers should ever use lightly, but it can surely be applied to Marc-André Hamelin. Since making his debut in 1985, this Montreal-born pianist now based in Boston continues to prove that his musical talents really are extra-ordinary, earning well-deserved accolades from critics and audiences alike. Although Hamelin has long championed composers slightly left of the mainstream, his newest recording features two that are decidedly more familiar – Janáček and Schumann – in an engaging program of music from the early and late Romantic periods.

The Art of Melancholy –  Songs by John Dowland
Iestyn Davies; Thomas Dunford
Hyperion CDA68007

Half a century ago a countertenor was still seen as unusual, some would say unnatural. There are now a substantial number of countertenors and I would rate Iestyn Davies as one of the very best, judging from the record under review and also from the recent recording of Handel’s Belshazzar, in which he sings the role of Daniel. He has a strong and very even voice with an excellent sense of pitch. He has himself said that for him the finest countertenor is Andreas Scholl and he has commented on Scholl’s ability to create “a column of sound which doesn’t weaken and stays absolutely even.” The comment fits Davies’ own singing.

Melancholy was a common malady in early 17th-century England. Think of Hamlet or of Jaques in As You Like It. It could become an affectation and it was delightfully parodied in Ben Jonson’s Every Man in his Humour, in which a character calls for a stool to be melancholy upon. Davies, however, believes strongly that, for Dowland, melancholy is more than just a pose. That conviction accounts for the passion which Davies brings to the songs on this disc.

Davies is ably accompanied by lutenist Thomas Dunford, who also has five solos. They include The Frog Galliard, a performance which, for good measure, throws in Greensleeves as an excursion. Davies sang in Vancouver, Banff and Calgary a couple of months ago. I hope we shall hear him in Toronto soon.

Terra Tremuit
Studio de musique ancienne de Montréal; Christopher Jackson
ATMA ACD2 2653

Several Renaissance composers dwell on the subject of world catastrophe – the cataclysms, floods, epidemics that will lead to humanity’s end. On this disc Christopher Jackson’s studio (40 years old this year) interprets doom-laden compositions by six such composers.

 An all-too-short one-minute motet Terra tremuit by William Byrd, with its sometimes clashing parts, sets the scene. Antoine Brumel’s five-movement Earthquake Mass for 12 voices follows, starting with a serene “Kyrie eleison” and a “Gloria” initially gentle but where the discordant music finally reflects the sinister nature of this compilation. It is certainly the case during Brumel’s “Sanctus, Benedictus”; his demands on the vocal abilities of the singers to change from high to low, and to perform melodic leaps must surely be intended to reflect the events of an earthquake.

 Then there are the composers who followed in the footsteps of Brumel. Vaet and Crecquillon, as employees at the court of the emperor Charles V, saw first hand the terrors of absolute power; not surprisingly they bring a mellow and melancholy richness to their compositions – both are terrified as they look to the last day and their judgment. More formal is Palestrina’s Terra tremuit. This depicts the aftermath of the earth’s trembling and the quiet that pertains as God rises in judgment.

 And if the sky does fall in, at least you will have been warned well in advance by some of the greatest early composers.

Le Jardin de Monsieur Rameau
Les Arts Florisants; William Christie
Les Arts Florissants Editions Edition AF002

Le Jardin des Voix is a two-week training program for young singers, organized by the ensemble Les Arts Florissants. It was launched in 2002 and this recording represents its sixth edition. Le Jardin de Monsieur Rameau was devised by Paul Agnew, the Associate Director of Les Arts Florissants. It was given as a semi-staged entertainment, first in Caen (in Normandy) and then on a tour that took the musicians as far west as New York and as far east as Helsinki.

In an interview printed in the booklet that comes with the CD, Agnew expresses the view that a normal training program may help a singer to perform the role of Gilda or that of Masetto but is of little help in 18th-century French opera. The training these young singers received has certainly paid off in their idiomatic command of both the literary and the musical language of the works performed. They are also very well attuned to each other.

The music of Rameau is central to the disc but there are also arias, duets and ensembles from Montéclair, Campra, Grandval, Dauvergne and Gluck. When I saw the track list I was concerned that the overall effect would be terribly fragmented, but I need not have worried. The program flows beautifully. I was especially taken with the alto-tenor duet from Rameau's Les fêtes d'Hébé, with the baritone aria from the fourth Act of his Dardanus and, most of all, with the heavenly quartet from his Les Indes galantes, which closes this recording.

Italian Memories
Mauro Bertoli
Independent (maurobertoli.com)

Despite Italy’s long-standing reputation as a country of vocal music, there is also a keyboard tradition going back as far as Frescobaldi – and what better way of sampling 300 years of Italian keyboard music than with this new recording titled Italian Memories with pianist Mauro Bertoli?

Born in Brescia, Italy, Bertoli has established an international reputation within a fairly short time, having appeared in recital and as a soloist with numerous chamber ensembles and orchestras throughout the world. A recipient of the prestigious Giuseppe Sinopoli award in 2006, Bertoli has been artist-in-residence at Carleton University in Ottawa since 2009. Italian Memories is his fourth recording, and one that clearly brings him back to his roots.

The CD opens with four miniatures by three composers, Benedetto Marcello, Mattia Vento and Domenico Paradisi. Bertoli’s playing is elegant and poised, easily demonstrating how well music originally intended for harpsichord can sound on a concert grand. The name Muzio Clementi is a more familiar one – is there a piano student who hasn’t played music by this Italian-born composer who spent most of his life in England and whose reputation rivalled that of Haydn? The two sonatas presented here are a delight, and Bertoli makes ease of the sometimes breakneck speed required of the performer. A complete change of pace comes with two brief and languorous pieces by Martucci and the Diario Indiano by Ferruccio Busoni, an homage to Native American culture. The latter is a true study in contrasts where Bertoli’s wonderful sense of tonal colour is juxtaposed with a formidable technique.

The final work is a true tour de force, music not by an Italian but by the 12- year- old Franz Liszt – the Impromptu Brilliant on Themes by Rossini and Spontini. Here, both Liszt and Bertoli pull out all the stops in this flamboyant piece, thus rounding out a splendid program of music that deserves greater exposure.

Brahms – String Quintets
Takács Quartet; Lawrence Power
Hyperion CDA67900

The string quintet, as an art form, offers ingenious possibilities for creating unique harmonies and colours, and Brahms took full advantage of that. While he was known to have some difficulties establishing the right medium for his creative ideas, with string quintets he had found a perfect vehicle for expressing the depth and uniqueness of his artistry. Edvard Grieg allowed for the same sentiments in one of his letters: “How different the person we call Brahms now suddenly appears to us! Now for the first time I see and feel how whole he was both as an artist and as a human being.”

In String Quintet in F Major, Op.88, we hear Brahms’ signature use of eighth notes against triplets enhanced by syncopation in the first movement. The second movement combines the characteristics of two movements by means of alternation, thus expressing both dark colours that evoke mystery and a light, pastoral character. The rhythmic energy of the closing movement grants a boisterous mood to the fugal subject. The String Quintet in G Major, Op.111, opens with a grand, densely scored first movement, followed by two middle movements with more alluring, dreamy melodies. The final movement follows the thread of different and at times surprising tonalities.

The members of the Takács Quartet and Lawrence Power present cohesive and thoughtful performances. They are equally at ease expressing melancholy and introspection as they are at bringing out the complexity of Brahms’ writing. Their vibrato is so exquisite that it makes every note meaningful. If you find yourself in a mood for contemplation, this is a perfect recording for such moments.