Telemann: Six Sonatas For Two Flutes

Praised for his “long-breathed phrases and luscious tone” by the Minneapolis Star Tribune, Canadian flutist Conor Nelson presents a new recording of Telemann’s 12 Fantasias for two Flute, a glorious mélange of genres and styles, inviting performers and listeners to myriad interpretational challenges and delights.

Praised for his “long-breathed phrases and luscious tone” by the Minneapolis Star Tribune, Canadian flutist Conor Nelson presents a new recording of Telemann’s 12 Fantasias for two Flute, a glorious mélange of genres and styles, inviting performers and listeners to myriad interpretational challenges and delights.

The German flute returned to the Germans Compared to the violin – with its six Sonatas and Partitas for solo violin and its six Sonatas for violin and obbligato harpsichord – the flute may seem a poor relation: the four sonatas for flute and obbligato harpsichord and the “solo” for flute without bass recorded here are the only chamber works Bach composed for the flute as a solo instrument (and even then, some of them may not have been originally written for the flute), to which may be added two trio sonatas: BWV 1039, for two flutes and basso continuo (another version of the Viola da gamba Sonata BWV 1027), and the trio sonata of the Musical Offering, BWV 1079/3.

The German flute returned to the Germans Compared to the violin – with its six Sonatas and Partitas for solo violin and its six Sonatas for violin and obbligato harpsichord – the flute may seem a poor relation: the four sonatas for flute and obbligato harpsichord and the “solo” for flute without bass recorded here are the only chamber works Bach composed for the flute as a solo instrument (and even then, some of them may not have been originally written for the flute), to which may be added two trio sonatas: BWV 1039, for two flutes and basso continuo (another version of the Viola da gamba Sonata BWV 1027), and the trio sonata of the Musical Offering, BWV 1079/3. But compared to the oboe or the recorder, for which nothing remains (though these instruments were well provided for by his contemporaries, particularly Telemann), the transverse flute is a spoiled child.