Purcell H Odes Pinnock

On 100 discs (99 CD & 1 DVD), this box presents the complete oeuvre of Trevor Pinnock and The English Concert on Archiv Produktion. Purcell, Vivaldi, Handel, Bach, Haydn and Mozart are the focus of the repertoire. Numerous recordings such as the Brandenburg Concertos, Corelli's Concerti Grossi or the symphonies of William Boyce are among the milestones of recording history. A Bach album from the ensemble's early days is released for the first time on CD, as well as the never-published Dead March from Handel's "Saul". A 184-page booklet with essays by Trevor Pinnock and Jonathan Freeman-Attwood, the director of the Royal Academy of Music, as well as numerous photos and documents complete the extensive portrait.

Dioclesian is the tale of a simple Roman private, Diocles, who fulfils the prophecy of Delphia (a prophetess, and hence Dioclesian's alternative title) that one day he will become emperor. In the meantime, Diocles avenges the slaying of the previous emperor and becomes a hero. With ambitions realized he discovers the he has over-played his hand by responding to Princess Aurelia's advances in the place of a nice homely girl called Drusilla, whom he had agreed to marry. The prophetess, who happens to be Drusilla's aunt, plans his come-uppance before he realizes the emptiness of his aspirations, abdicates and returns to nature and Drusilla.

Fly, bold rebellion was one of Purcell’s early Welcome Songs, composed for Charles II in 1683. The manuscript gives no indication of the date of the first performance, but it seems evident from the anonymous author of the words that it was written shortly after the discovery of the Rye House Plot, which took place in June 1683. The Ode thus would seem likely to have been performed to celebrate Charles’s return from Windsor to Whitehall at the end of June, or perhaps later in the year on his return to London from Winchester (25 September) or Newmarket (20 October). After the splendid two-part Symphony, the Ode contains the already established selection of choruses, trios and solos, interspersed with Purcell’s deliciously scored string ritornelli.

Purcell and the majority of the British public were genuinely fond of Queen Mary, who with William replaced King James on the throne when he fled to the continent. London musicians breathed a collective sigh of relief at the Glorious Revolution and Purcell composed six of his finest Odes to honour his new Queen’s birthday.

C.P.E. Bach eclipsed his legendary father s fame to become the mid-18th century s leading German composer. This wide-ranging collection of symphonies, concertos and vocal works by the great forerunner of Haydn and Mozart is performed by authoritative interpreters including Trevor Pinnock and The English Concert. The evident delight of the musicians in this music makes for rewarding listening … Impressive and fascinating.

For his 1694 offering to the Queen, Come ye sons of Art, away, Purcell was on sparkling form, and produced an Ode markedly different to the majority of the twenty-two works which had preceded it. The forces utilized were greater than normal, with an orchestra replacing the more usual single strings, and there was a clearly defined role for the chorus. Recent successes on the stage had led to this more expansive style of composition, and the inspired text (probably by Nahum Tate), full of references to music and musical instruments, was one which gave Purcell’s fertile imagination plenty of source material.

The last, and greatest, of Purcell’s four Odes to St Cecilia, Hail! bright Cecilia was composed to a text by Nicholas Brady in 1692 in honour of the feast day of Saint Cecilia, patron saint of musicians. It is a celebratory work comprising of masterful instrumental sections, majestic choruses, and varied solos, duets and trios. Written in 1695, Who can from joy refrain? was composed as an ode celebrating the Duke of Gloucester’s sixth birthday. Both these works reveal the unparalleled richness of the composer’s musical invention and explain why, more than three hundred years later, Henry Purcell is still regarded as one of Britain’s finest composers.

Ye tuneful Muses was written in 1686, most probably to celebrate the return of the Court from Windsor to Whitehall on 1 October. As the birthday of King James II fell on 14 October some scholars have suggested it is possible that the celebrations were combined, for the diarist Luttrell recorded that the birthday was ‘observed with great solemnity … the day concluded with ringing of bells, bonefires and a ball at Court’, but there is little in the text to suggest this was so. That anonymous author did however provide Purcell with a good libretto, full of variety and vivid material for compositional inspiration, especially in its references to music and musical instruments and, as ever, Purcell did not fail.

With William and Mary duly crowned there was more topical material available than usual, and the Stewards commissioned the best available author and composer to celebrate in ‘a very splendid Entertainment of all sorts of Vocal and Instrumental Musick’. Thomas D’Urfey included the libretto in his Pills to Purge Melancholy, describing it as ‘An Ode on the Assembly of the Nobility and Gentry of the City and County of York, at the Anniversary Feast, March the 27th, 1690. Set to Musick by Mr. Henry Purcell. One of the finest Compositions he ever made, and cost £100 the performing’. Of old, when heroes thought it base was ostensibly a history of York from Roman times onwards, but it also contained allegories of the Glorious Revolution. Despite D’Urfey’s sometimes contrived text, Purcell responds with music of high quality.

Philippe Herreweghe and the Choeur et Orchestre du Collegium Vocale 1998 recording of Purcell's celebratory masterpiece may be more a Vivat! Radieuse Cecile, Vivat! than Hail, Bright Cecilia, but it is still one of the all-time great recordings of the work. Herreweghe more than almost any other conductor of the past 20 years captures the heights and depths of the music.