Ouverture Burlesque

Five lesser-known pieces (one orchestral suite and four instrumental concertos) from the over-abundant pen of Georg Philipp Telemann are presented in this second collection by the British ensemble Collegium Musicum 90, here directed by its co-founder, gifted violinist Simon Standage, whose earlier recordings with the English Concert and the Academy of Ancient Music are the guarantors of his classiness.

Telemann is never more irresistible than when he's in light-hearted pictorial mode, and both these new releases feature one of the most entertainingly evocative of all his overture-suites for strings, the Burlesque de Quixote. Taking episodes from the Cervantes novel as its inspiration, it provides us with a memorable sequence of cameos, from the deluded Don tilting at windmills and sighing with love, to Sancho Panza tossed high in a blanket, to portrayals of the pair's respective steeds.

Telemann is never more irresistible than when he's in light-hearted pictorial mode, and both these new releases feature one of the most entertainingly evocative of all his overture-suites for strings, the Burlesque de Quixote. Taking episodes from the Cervantes novel as its inspiration, it provides us with a memorable sequence of cameos, from the deluded Don tilting at windmills and sighing with love, to Sancho Panza tossed high in a blanket, to portrayals of the pair's respective steeds. Telemann achieves all this with such humour and descriptive precision that, when you hear it, you'll surely laugh in delighted recognition. What a good film composer he would have been!

Hamburg, 1734. The most extravagant of harpsichord builders, Hieronÿmus Albrecht Hass, created an instrument whose sonority was inspired by the variety and amplitude of the organ. Here, on a copy of this unique harpsichord, Andreas Staier plays pieces by the finest composers who were attracted to the Hanseatic city: a riot of colours!

A precursor in this field as in so many others, Telemann gave the viola its very first masterpieces, immediately establishing it as a solo instrument in its own right. Alongside Sabine Fehlandt and the musicians of the Akademie für Alte Musik Berlin, Antoine Tamestit pays splendid tribute to this pioneering music, which blends melodic charm and contrapuntal rigour into an organic whole.

No eighteenth-century composer was so adept at so many musical styles as Georg Philipp Telemann. Telemann's versatility and inventiveness kept his musical style avant-garde during his entire life. He was not only praised by his contemporaries but was highly respected by the next generation: his fame was immense. Thererfore New Collegium, one of the promising ensembles of the younger generation, has chosen for their first CD on the Ramée label to show Telemann the chameleon, the breadth of his musical palette. Some of the pieces will undoubtedly sound familiar; others, such as the Italianate Trio for violin and cello obbligato, or the pastoral Trio for two violins in scordatura, will surely be delightful, new surprises for many. Coming in and out of disguise with Telemann’s chameleonic notes we often find ourselves wondering: is this truly music by just one composer, not six?