Giuseppe Valentini Ensemble 415 Banchini Concerti Grossi e a Quattro Violini, Op. 7 (2007, Zig Zag # Zzt2020801)

Giuseppe Valentini - Concerti Grossi e a Quattro Violini, Op. 7
Ensemble 415 / Chiara Banchini
EAC+LOG+CUE | WV: 396 MB | Full Artwork: 110 MB | 5% Recovery Info
Label/Cat#: Zig Zag # ZZT2020801 | Country/Year: France 2007
Genre: Classical | Style: Baroque

"Ensemble 415 is a chamber ensemble devoted largely to the performance of Baroque music on period instruments. The numerical reference in the group's name derives from the pitch used for tuning instruments in the Baroque era. In performing chamber music, Ensemble 415 consists of just a few players, but for larger compositions, the number expands to a minimum of 13 and can reach up to as high as 40 performers. The ensemble's repertory has been broad over the years, taking in many Baroque standards by J.S. Bach, Vivaldi, and Handel, as well as lesser known fare by Muffat and others…"

Most listeners to 18th century music in the modern era are well familiar with JS Bach, perhaps his sons Karl Philipp Emanuel, Wilhem Friedemann, and Johann Christian, certainly Handel, Vivaldi, and Scarlatti, and perhaps Purcell. In the last 30 years we are fortunate to have been given access through CD recordings to similar music from the enormous host of contemporaries of these masters of the Baroque, and it is constantly astonishing how high the quality of the written music was throughout the 18th century. Surely there were mediocre or perhaps poor composers, but the sheer number of really good ones continues to amaze.

Francesco Geminiani - Concerti Grossi 1, 3, 5, 8, 10, 11 et la Follia
Ensemble 415 / Chiara Banchini
EAC+LOG+CUE | WV: 365 MB | Full Artwork: 66 MB | 5% Recovery Info
Label/Cat#: ZigZag # ZZT2040301.1 | Country/Year: France 2007
Genre: Classical | Style: Baroque

"Ensemble 415 is a chamber ensemble devoted largely to the performance of Baroque music on period instruments. The numerical reference in the group's name derives from the pitch used for tuning instruments in the Baroque era. In performing chamber music, Ensemble 415 consists of just a few players, but for larger compositions, the number expands to a minimum of 13 and can reach up to as high as 40 performers. The ensemble's repertory has been broad over the years, taking in many Baroque standards by J.S. Bach, Vivaldi, and Handel, as well as lesser known fare by Muffat and others…"

Giuseppe Tartini - Concertos
Ensemble 415 / Chiara Banchini / Enrico Gatti / Roel Dieltiens
EAC+LOG+CUE | WV: 359 MB | Full Artwork: 171 MB | 5% Recovery Info
Label/Cat#: Harmonia Mundi # HMA 1951548 | Country/Year: France 2010, 1995
Genre: Classical | Style: Baroque

"Ensemble 415 is a chamber ensemble devoted largely to the performance of Baroque music on period instruments. The numerical reference in the group's name derives from the pitch used for tuning instruments in the Baroque era. In performing chamber music, Ensemble 415 consists of just a few players, but for larger compositions, the number expands to a minimum of 13 and can reach up to as high as 40 performers. The ensemble's repertory has been broad over the years, taking in many Baroque standards by J.S. Bach, Vivaldi, and Handel, as well as lesser known fare by Muffat and others…"

Harmonia Mundi's Geminiani: Concerti Grossi VII-XII (after Corelli, Op. 5) is a single disc excerpted from a larger set issued in 1999 including all of Geminiani's concerti based on models of Corelli. That set was, and is, something of an expensive proposition, but certainly a first-class choice for the music of Geminiani, for the way the Academy of Ancient Music sounds under the direction of Andrew Manze and as representative of late English Baroque music as a whole. This disc is a single-disc condensation drawn from the earlier set that comes, as an added bonus, with a thick catalog of Harmonia Mundi's active releases, and the asking price is modest.

Andrew Manze is not only a superb violinist – check out his Biber sonatas – but also a superb music director. Since taking over the calcified old Academy of Ancient Music and bringing the group with him to Harmonia Mundi, he has produced a stunning series of recordings: a couple of Vivaldi discs, a wonderful set of Handel's Opus 6 concertos, a sublime disc of the Bach concertos. Now they have released Geminiani's Concerto Grossi after Corelli's Op. 5, and it is their best yet.

Antonio Vivaldi - Concerto a Quattro Violini, L'Estro Armonico
Ensemble 415 / Chiara Banchini
EAC+LOG+CUE | WV: 269 MB | Full Artwork: 189 MB | 5% Recovery Info
Label/Cat#: Zig Zag # ZZT070902 | Country/Year: France 2006
Genre: Classical | Style: Baroque

"Ensemble 415 is a chamber ensemble devoted largely to the performance of Baroque music on period instruments. The numerical reference in the group's name derives from the pitch used for tuning instruments in the Baroque era. In performing chamber music, Ensemble 415 consists of just a few players, but for larger compositions, the number expands to a minimum of 13 and can reach up to as high as 40 performers. The ensemble's repertory has been broad over the years, taking in many Baroque standards by J.S. Bach, Vivaldi, and Handel, as well as lesser known fare by Muffat and others…"

This disc of Vivaldi concertos celebrates ten years of the French label Zig-Zag Territoires. The fulsome paean contained in the booklet, sometimes flowery in its prose, sometimes fanciful in its content – ‘Long may our CDs continue to stir this life force within you!’ etc. – may not win new friends, but the playing of Ensemble 415 certainly should. Director and founder of the group, Chiara Banchini has chosen the four Concertos for four violins from Vivaldi’s first and most varied printed sets, L’estro armonico (1711), as well as two further works that, along with the greater number of his concertos remained unpublished during Vivaldi’s lifetime, a Concerto in F major for three violins (RV 551) and in B flat for four (RV 553).