Davide Locatelli Hyper Silent

This box set collects four individual albums of the early '90s by veteran historical-instrument violinist Elizabeth Wallfisch and the Raglan Baroque Players, each containing three of the 12 violin concertos included here. The box, although not issued in Hyperion's budget Helios series, is offered at a cut-rate price. Locatelli was a pure virtuoso; he was no Vivaldi, and these works had one purpose and one only: to display his nearly unthinkable capabilities on the violin. As such, the entire set may be of more interest to performers and specialists than to general listeners; three CDs of Locatelli are bit much.

Locatelli’s set of Opus 1 Concerti grossi, although indebted to Corelli (with the Eighth of the set ending with a Christmas Pastorale), similarly has a style and personality all its own. The invention is vigorous, the expressive range appealing. The Capella Istropolitana play with crisp attack, plenty of sparkle and resilient rhythms, while slow movements reveal a keen identity with the lessons of period performance, even though modern instruments are used. The Naxos recording is admirable.

Locatelli was one of the most impressive violin virtuosos of the first half of the eighteenth century. Considered today as a sort of Baroque Paganini, he left picturesque, colourful, strikingly modern pieces for his instrument. A few years after a Mozart collaboration that earned them worldwide acclaim, Isabelle Faust and the musicians of Il Giardino Armonico bring out the full narrative intensity of these concertos, worthy of the operatic stage!

Leclair, Locatelli - L'Ange et le Diable (2001)
Classical | EAC: FLAC+Cue+Log | 1 Cd, Covers | 380 Mb
Label: Astrée - Date: 2001

Created in 1997, The Rare Fruits Council has awakened the enthusiasm of the public and obtained superlative praise in critical comments all over the world: "Their music flows like a waterfall", "bursts out like firework", "boundless and bold talent of its members", "carried away by real and wild frenzy", "infinite expressiveness" are some of the qualifying adjectives and phrases that have described the performances of the group…

Giuseppe Torelli, whose native land was Veneto, is deservedly included among the composers who contributed to the renown and success of the Bolognese School, which was undoubtedly one of the keystones of Italian Baroque music, together with the Venetian, Roman and Neapolitan Schools. Torelli’s production that has been handed down to us includes almost 200 works, most of them chamber-music instrumental compositions and orchestral pieces with solo performers. Eight of these works are in print, practically all of them published in Bologna from 1686 onwards.

As the rather extensive booklet notes by countertenor Flavio Ferri-Benedetti state, the Italian secular cantata was a byproduct of the so-called focus of the early 18th-century intellectual circles on good poetry based generally on classical themes. The result was a veritable torrent of smaller chamber works meant to highlight this literary genre, which had the effect of establishing it as one of the preferred vocal formats of the period. The settings were generally for voice and continuo, but here one finds a selection of works that include a full four-part accompaniment of strings. This allows for a fuller texture, making them more akin to brief opera scenes.

When considering the first set of compositions designed to truly extend and test the technical limits of the violin, most would first consider the 24 Caprices of Paganini. However, more than a century before Paganini was even thought of, Italian composer Pietro Locatelli was pushing the violin to its limits with his four concertos of Opus 3, subtitled the "Art of the Violin."