Gamba

Ruth Gipps (1921 – 1999) was born in the English seaside resort of Bexhill-on-Sea. Encouraged as a child by an ambitious pianist mother, she appeared locally as a prodigy pianist. She was accepted by the Royal College of Music in 1937, at the age of sixteen, having won the Caird Scholarship. She quickly matured, both as composer and pianist. She studied with Vaughan Williams and Gordon Jacob, and later the oboe with Leon Goossens. During the Second World War she gained a position as oboist with the City of Birmingham Orchestra and devoted a great deal of her time to composing. Three of the works on this album were composed during the war: the Oboe Concerto, the tone poem Death on the Pale Horse, and the overture Chanticleer (derived from an opera which, sadly, she never completed).

Kapellmeister at Magdeburg Cathedral for 43 years, all of Ruhe's compositions are lost except for these five gamba works. Probably written in the 1730s, they are lively, forward-looking pieces in three and four movements (the suite has eight) which anticipate early Classical style.

It is perhaps a truism that virtually all so-called great composers had a special preference for the viola as da braccio (on the arm, i.e. the modern instrument) or da gamba , a versatile instrument of the viol family that was a particular focus of Baroque composers. Indeed, the Sixth Brandenburg features pairs of both instruments, da braccio and da gamba, and what would the passions be without the solo work Bach includes for each? This may have been due to the fact that one of his employers, Duke Leopold of Saxony-Anhalt-Cöthen, liked to play it, but more likely Bach liked the instrument’s versatility and distinctive timbre.

This set contains the complete works by Telemann in which the Viola da Gamba (or viol) has a prominent and soloistic role. The Viola da Gamba may be described as the predecessor of the modern Violoncello, and in its time it was a popular instrument much in use in instrumental music and as part of the Basso Continuo. Its slightly more modest volume compared with the cello is more than compensated by its specific timbre, with its vocal and sometimes melancholic qualities.

C.P.E. Bach's music often has a bizarrely experimental quality mixed incongruously but fascinatingly with a conservatism born of his father's influence, and this program of early works, dating from the 1740s and 1750s, offers good examples.

Cassandra Luckhardt has established an international reputation as a soloist, chamber and orchestral musician and teacher on both cello and viola da gamba. Cassandra has played and recorded as principal cello with The Academy of Ancient Music, Il Complesso Barocco, Les Musiciens du Louvre and as gamba soloist with the King's Consort.