Europe Here 2022q4

This is the fourth instalment in Deutsche Grammophon’s new Mozart cycle. In the end this will encompass the seven great operas, from Idomeneo forwards. I haven’t heard the previous three, but from the reviews I have seen the reception has been rather mixed. Concerning this latest issue I am also in two minds. The problem, as I see it, is that Nézet-Séguin hasn’t quite decided what he is up to. He has the excellent Chamber Orchestra of Europe at his disposal.

If you’re approaching these familiar Bach concertos for the first time, or want inexpensive performances that still provide decent musical rewards, then you won’t go far wrong with this Eloquence disc. Salvatore Accardo (who also directs the Chamber Orchestra of Europe) is soloist in the violin concertos in A minor and E major. Both are earnest, direct readings that hardly differ from Accardo’s EMI remakes.

How appropriate that Harnoncourt, a conductor who through recordings has probably done more than anyone else to allow us to explore Bach's choral music, should now turn his attention to Mendelssohn; a composer who, as a conductor, was responsible in his time for the revival of Bach's fortunes, not to mention revising the Leipzig Gewandhaus Orchestra's programmes to ensure that Mozart, Beethoven, Haydn, Handel and Bach formed the backbone of the repertoire—exactly those composers, in fact, who form the core of Harnoncourt's discography.