Szobel Hermann Szobel

J.S. Bach’s talent seems to flow in his grandson’s blood at least as strongly as in any of his sons. Wilhelm Friedrich Ernst Bach’s two symphonies (as well as the vocal works featured here) inhabit the sound-world of mid- to late Mozart, albeit without the brilliance (in every sense of the word). This Bach’s wind writing is tasteful, and makes good use of the (then) newly-arrived clarinet. The Andante of the C major symphony is quite beautiful, with a dolefully sweet oboe solo throughout the movement. The period strings of Das Kleine Konzert are lively, clean, and in tune, although the violin soloist is not quite up to the rapid passage-work at the end of the G major symphony.

This set is a rerelease of recordings made in 1991, not previously reviewed in Read more . In the order listed in the header, these four cantatas were composed for the following festal days in the liturgical church calendar: the Third Sunday in Advent, the Feast of St. John the Baptist, Pentecost, and Easter Sunday. All stem from the time of the younger Bach’s increasingly fractious and unhappy years as director of music in Halle, which spanned 1747 to 1764. The first of these is definitely known to have been written in 1749; the dates for the others are less certain, but stem from the mid to late 1750s.

Hermann Bischoff, a pupil of Richard Strauss, was a highly gifted composer and always reaped high praise from music critics and the press, but his compositional output remained relatively small. A mere two symphonies, two shorter orchestral pieces, one and a half operas, and a handful of songs were produced during his lifetime. This disc is the second in a two volume series and presents the recording premieres of Symphony No. 2 and Introduktion & Rondo.

Throughout his life Telemann collaborated with good poets who prepared sacred texts for him, usually to be set as annual cycles for the church year. This practice enabled him to design each of his annual cycles, as a rule consisting of seventy-two cantatas for each Sunday and feast day, on the basis of a unique overall idea. Annual cycles such as Geistliches Singen und Spielen, the »Annual Cycle in the Oratorio Style« and »Musicalisches Lob Gottes« not only lend expression to the artistic program and ideas of one of the most important sacred music composers of the eighteenth century but also document his deep religiosity.

Ernst Theodor Wilhelm Hoffmann (Königsberg, January 24, 1776 – Berlin, June 25, 1822), who changed his third name to Amadeus in honour to Mozart, is one of the best-known representatives of German Romanticism, and a pioneer of the fantasy genre, with a taste for the macabre. He was also a jurist, composer, music critic, draftsman and caricaturist.
As a musician, he composed about 80 works, including several operas, among them Aurora (1811-12), after Franz von Holbein, and Undine (1814), after Baron Friedrich de la Motte Fouqué's tale, one symphony, sacred and chamber music, as well as instrumental pieces.

Written for London audiences in 1770, Johann Christian Bach’s only extant oratorio, Gioas, Re di Guida, is a proverbial curate’s egg. Attempting to please both those weaned on Handel and those hoping to hear the oratorio genre given a rococo makeover, it failed to please either. Such was London’s veneration for the spirit of Handel that Bach was booed when he dared play an organ interlude between acts; and despite George III’s patronage, the work was soon neglected. Audiences of the time simply did not want to hear Italian operatic conventions in their oratorios.

Composed in 1778, J.C. Bach's La Clemenza di Scipione is a nice, direct, fat-free work. The arias tend to be short (not one of them is a da capo), the recitatives are to the point and likewise brief, and the action moves swiftly. Roman Scipio (tenor) has taken Cartagena and Spanish soprano princess Arsinda (and her soprano pal, Idalba) prisoner. Male soprano, fellow non-Roman Lucieo, is betrothed to Arsinda, while the Roman general Marzio (tenor) is in love with Idalba and vice-versa. The whole plot revolves around the heroic Lucieo's attempts to rescue Arsinda, et al., his being taken prisoner, and his being threatened by death if he refuses to pledge allegiance to Rome.

Wie weit komponierende Söhne und Väter stilistisch auseinander liegen können, wird oft an dem Vergleich Johann Sebastians und Johann Christian Bachs demonstriert. Nun, es gibt einen ähnlich gelagerten Fall: Johann Friedrich Fasch (1688–1758) und sein Sohn Carl (1736–1800).

Cpo has finally found the composer who should actually be their house composer: Christian Westerhoff from Osnabrück. This Mozart contemporary was the son of an Osnabrück town musician and very soon found a post as a violinist and double bassist at the closest court chapel. On this recording of orchestral works the young clarinettist Sebastian Manz performs alongside Albrecht Holder on bassoon. They are accompanied by the Osnabrück Symphony Orchestra.

George Philipp Telemann was a composer whose creative powers continued undiminished through his old age of eighty six years. The last decade of his life witnessed an astonishing creative surge, perhaps comparable only to that of Verdi. It was then that the eighty-year-old, with all the benefits of mature mastery at his command, penned some of his most beautiful vocal works. The oratorio "The Delivered Israel" is a work from this period.