Cpe Bach Concertos Loffier

It was the Bachs who launched the harpsichord on its career as a concerto soloist and the sons did not wait to follow in father's wake; the first of Carl Philipp Emanuel's 52 concertos, spanning more than 50 years, probably just predates the first of JSB's. Neither did they pursue the practice of having more than two soloists. In his F major Concerto (the numbering of which differs from that given in Grove: H410, Wq46) CPE accepts the formal plan of the ritornello but not the concept of its unity of thematic mood; he introduces a diversity that is more like that of the exposition in sonata form—though the resemblance ends there, and the element of contrast is maintained in the 'solo' episodes, not derived from the ritornello material.

This sparkling recording of CPE Bach concertos follows Rachel Brown's highly acclaimed recording of Quantz concertos for Hyperion, also with The Brandenburg Consort under Roy Goodman's direction. Of Bach's five extant flute concertos the D minor may have been composed as early as 1747, the A major in 1753 and the G major in 1755.

Trevor Pinnock directs The English Concert, a period-instrument orchestra with soloists Simon Standage, violin; Stephen Preston, flute & Anthony Pleeth, cello, in a performance of four concertos by Antonio Vivaldi (1678-1741) and a bonus concerto by Carl Philip Emanuel Bach (1714-1788).

In her fine Gramophone Award-winning debut disc (of Pieces de clavecin by Jacquet de la Guerre), Carole Cerasi brought a sparkling immediacy and character to music usually the esoteric domain of a minority. Now, she turns her attention to six sonatas by CPE Bach in another recital of natural flair and discernment. The achievement is perhaps all the more striking in that this Bach son is an especially tricky customer: his light, unpredictable sensibilities depend on a strong undercurrent of logical reference, mainly a rhythmic and contrapuntal presence inherited from his father. Strong artistic instincts are the critical adhesive.

Although we know of at least five concertos J.S. Bach wrote for solo organ we have no surviving Bach organ concertos with orchestral accompaniment. Contrast this with the 200+ cantatas: of these, 18 feature organ obbligato, which Bach uses as a solo instrument in arias, choral sections and sinfonias. The most obviously conspicuous date to 1726. In May to November of that year, Bach composed six cantatas which assign a prominent solo role to the organ. Most of these are reworkings of movements of lost violin and oboe concertos written in Bach’s time at Weimar and Köthen. Why Bach wrote such a number of obbligato organ cantatas in such a short period remains unknown.

This is a really great five-CD set. You get all of Bach's concertos except the Brandenburgs - which is a shame because Pinnock's Brandenburgs are terrific. Nonetheless, this remains an absolutely cracking collection of some of Bach's most enjoyable music in excellent performances. In the Harpsichord Concertos Pinnock is himself the soloist and shows why he is such a very well-liked and highly regarded musician. The music springs to life under his fingers (and under his direction) and many of these performances set new and enduring standards when first released in the early 1980s. They have informed much subsequent Bach playing and have worn extremely well themselves, sounding as fresh and involving as they did nearly 30 years ago. He is joined by other fine harpsichordists in the concerti for two, three and four harpsichords, (Kenneth Gilbert, Nicholas Kraemer and Lars Ulrich Mortensen) and the Concerto for Four Harpsichords in particular is an absolute joy.

The extant concertos by Johann Sebastian Bach for one harpsichord and strings were all composed before 1738, which makes them some of the first, if not the first keyboard concertos – a genre destined to become one of the most popular within classical music. In all likelihood Bach wrote them for his own use (or that of his talented sons) – probably to be performed with Leipzig’s Collegium Musicum of which he had taken over as director in 1729. The fresh and exuberant character one finds in the concertos seems to reflect how much Bach enjoyed the opportunity to engage with his fellow musicians.

This Bach release by American harpsichordist Elizabeth Farr is unusual in several respects and will be welcomed by listeners with Bach collections of any size. Start with the harpsichord, built by the iconoclastic maker Keith Hill in rural Manchester, MI. It's modeled on the Dutch Ruckers instruments of the 17th century, but it includes a set of 16-foot strings, and it has a truly mighty sound, beautifully captured at what is identified as Ploger Hall in the same locality. It's not clear what this venue is, but it's vast improvement over Naxos' preferred church sites. The booklet (in English only) includes a short note from Hill admitting that such a harpsichord would have been rare in Bach's time, but suggesting that it was a luxury item that its "value cannot be overestimated" when it is used where it makes musical sense. That's definitely the case here. These "concertos for solo harpsichord" are transcriptions Bach made for solo keyboard in the early 1710s, of mostly violin concertos by mostly Italian composers. It is not known for certain why Bach made them; he may simply have liked the music and wanted to study it more closely, but Farr's detailed notes also indicate that the transcriptions might have been done at the behest of Bach's patron at the time, the Duke of Weimar.