Grazzi

Few people nowadays seriously believe Vivaldi wrote the same concerto five hundred times. But the view that there is little variety in Vivaldi's oeuvre is still widely held. Louis T. Vatoison, in the programme notes to this recording, has a strongly different perception: "a Vivaldi concerto must (…) be seen as an individual 'snapshot', whose instrumental layout or formal structure implicitly reveal at what period, and sometimes even for whom it was written". The music on this disc gives ample evidence for this view.

Jordi Savall & Hesperion XX - Ensaladas, 15th-17th Century (1987) {Astrée-Auvidis E 7742}
EAC rip (secure mode) | FLAC (tracks)+CUE+LOG -> 252 Mb | MP3 @320 -> 122 Mb
Full Artwork @ 300 dpi (jpg) -> 50 Mb | 5% repair rar
© 1987 Astrée / Auvidis | E 7742
Classical / Renaissance / Vocal Music

The Ensalada (musical salad) is a poetical work which combines lines in different languages, as well as instrumental sonatas. It is rooted in the medieval practice of singing different texts simultaneously, and incorporates well-known romances and madrigalist elements. Generally based on stories from Christ birth, ensaladas a big portrait, a la Janequin, occupying a midway position between art and folk music.

A celebration of instrumental Baroque splendour! This set present an anthology of Italian Baroque composers, featuring their instrumental output. Obviously the famous composers have their fair share: Vivaldi, Albinoni, Locatelli, Corelli, but also lesser known composers are featured: Barsanti, Bassani, Veracini, Nardini, Stradella, Vitali, Mancini, Platti, Legrenze and many more, over 30 composers! Performances by leading ensembles specialized in the Historically Informed Performance Practice: L'Arte dell'Arco/Federico Guglielmo, Ensemble Cordia/Stefano Veggetti, Violini Capricciosi/Igor Ruhadze, MusicaAmphion/Pieter Jan Belder and many more. A treasure trove of solo concertos, concerti grossi, sinfonias, overtures, trio sonatas and solo sonatas from the Golden Era of the Italian Baroque, era of joy, passion and brilliance!

Sometimes you just want to relax. Here is one of my favorite ways. These Divertimenti by Mozart weren't even written for listening; they served as background music for dinners and social events. But Mozart couldn't write empty music, and as undemanding as these pieces are, there is always something to reward your attention in every measure. This sextet of period instrument wind players has exactly the right touch for the music. They play with alertness to every detail and relaxation in expression. The result is one of the most delightful, blissfully undemanding CDs in the catalog.

Despite the use of period instruments, including some fine blaring natural horns, this couldn't be called a historically informed performance of Handel's Royal Fireworks Music, HWV 351. The work was not composed for a pleasant onboard afternoon musicale like the Water Music, but instead was part of an event that would have been one of the top items on CNN Headline News for 1749: the celebration of the Peace of Aix-la-Chapelle, brokered by King George II.

Twelve years younger than Bach and Handel, Giovanni BenedePo PlaPi left us a collection of nine Concerti per il cembalo obligato which rank not only among the very early examples of composition for keyboard instrument and strings, but also and above all, the first specimens especially conceived for the fortepiano, the new instrument invented by Bartolomeo Cristofori. Billiant soloist and regular keyboard player of Zefiro, Luca Guglielmi offers us, for the first time on period instruments three brilliant and foreseeing piano concertos, interspersed with the large-scale Piano Sonata in C minor, a very widespread composition at the time, and the baroque Sonata for oboe, with a special appearence by Paolo Grazzi.

These two CDs were originally recorded and released by naïve in the mid 1990s; recorded out of numerical order, sonatas 5, 6 and 2 are on the first disk, while 1, 3 (in which a violin replaces one of the oboes) and 4 are on the other. Both sets involve a theorbo and deep string bass (contrabbasso on CD1 and violone on CD2), all played by different players. The wind soloists are constant (and what a stellar line-up – Paolo Grazzi and Alfredo Bernardini on oboe and Alberto Grazzi on bassoon); Manfredo Kraemer is the violinist.

The three orchestral suites on this disc afford splendid examples of Telemann's seemingly inexhaustible invention in this sphere. The best-known of the suites is that in C major for three oboes, bassoon and strings. It's one of countless pieces that demonstrate Telemann's sympathy for and knowledge of the oboe. The movements are effectively contrasted with the composer juxtaposing for example a vigorous Bourree en trompette with a drowsy ''Sommeille'' whose somnolent quavers have almost hypnotic powers. Pinnock revels in scene-painting of this kind, just as he invariably hits upon effective tempos for the dances.