Harpsichord

Giovanni Battista Sammartini was without doubt the most active and prolific musician in Milan for three quarters of the eighteenth century. He was both a performer and a composer - of opera, sacred, symphonic and chamber works - but today he is mainly known for his contribution to the development of the modern symphony in the form later adopted and codified by Austro-German composers.

The new album by Ibrahim Aziz (viola da gamba) and Masumi Yamamoto (harpsichord) features works by Handel including the premire recording of the Kassel Sonata No. 5. This is the first time a whole album of Handel featuring viola da gamba has been published.George Frideric Handel is regarded as one of the greatest composers of the baroque era, known especially for his operas, oratorios, concertos and keyboard works. His chamber works include a fine selection of solo and trio sonatas with basso continuo, written for a variety of instruments such as the violin, recorder and transverse flute. In Handel's lifetime, the viola da gamba (or viol, as it is also known), was highly regarded in some parts of Europe and Handel featured the instrument in numerous works.

The term used to describe the epoch in which the works brought together on this album were composed is a matter of dispute. Did it come before the period of Viennese classicism, which means that it represents “pre-Classicism?” Or is it part of this period, that is, “Early Classicism?” The Austrian musicologist Rudolf Flotzinger came up with a pithy formulation for this phase of music history, terming it “the epoch between the epochs,” which means that it is no longer Baroque and not yet Classicism. During this period, in the middle of the eighteenth century and in the age of Empress Maria Theresa, the genres of instrumental ensemble music continuing even today to dominate the concert repertoire were developed – including the “clavier concerto,” which was performed in equal measure on the organ, on the harpsichord, and later on the pianoforte. The designation “clavier” current at that time merely generally referred to an instrument with claves (keys).

Toucher Bach: for us this means working towards the inner core of the music, towards the mutually supportive network of voices that ensures the stability of the counterpoint in an artistic form. Great architectural masterpieces have done the same for thousands of years: the columns of the ancient Egyptians, the facades of the Rococo period and the shapes designed by Zaha Hadid cause even monumental buildings to appear in an alternative aggregate state that is both alive and flowing.

To arouse wonder: this was the mission the Baroque bequeathed to the Galant style. The celebrated opera composer and keyboard virtuoso Baldassare Galuppi achieved this by applying tools from the visual arts to music, playing with light, colour, and perspective. The trendsetting fire of his imagination and the sweetness of his cantabiles captured the spirit of the city of Venice with the whimsy and drama of its new Goldonian theatre, earning him renown throughout Europe. Wonder in Venice is a selection of solo sonatas and concertos for harpsichord and strings that showcase the eclecticism of Galuppi's music, which combines the brilliance of the Venetian Galant style with tempestuous Sturm und Drang outbursts.

To arouse wonder: this was the mission the Baroque bequeathed to the Galant style.

Swiss composer Frank Martin (1890–1974) wrote across all genres but is known for his works for an unusual instrument. Where his 1944 work, Petite symphonie concertante, uses the instrument in conjunction with harp and piano, his 1951–1952 work, Concerto for harpsichord and small orchestra, takes the instrument and pits it against a small orchestra. The instrument in question is the harpsichord. However, this is not the harpsichord of the 17th and 18th centuries, which died and vanished in the 19th century, but the new revival harpsichord of the 20th century.

Acclaimed, multiple Grammy-nominated harpsichordist Jory Vinikour partners with renowned conductor Scott Speck and the award-winning Chicago Philharmonic for an exciting program of modern harpsichord concertos. Featuring the premiere recording of American composer Ned Rorem’s neoclassical 1946 Concertino da Camera, the album also includes English composer Walter Leigh’s charming, brief Concertino for Harpsichord and Strings, Czech composer Viktor Kalabis’s substantial, tour de force Harpsichord Concerto, and contemporary composer Michael Nyman’s wild Concerto for Amplified Harpsichord and Strings — a real sonic blockbuster.

Two-time Grammy Award-nominated harpsichordist Jory Vinikour joins the Chicago Philharmonic, “one of the country’s finest symphonic orchestras” (Chicago Tribune), and its artistic director Scott Speck in a program of 20th-century harpsichord concertos spanning more than six decades.