Haydn Kuijken

Sigiswald Kuijken was born in 1944 close to Brussels. He studied violin at the conservatories of Bruges and Brussels, completing his studies at the latter institution with Maurice Raskin in 1964. He came into contact with early music at a very young age, together with his brother Wieland. Studying on his own, he gained a thorough knowledge of specific 17th- and 18th-century performance techniques and conventions of interpretation on violin and viola da gamba This led to the introduction, in 1969, of a more authentic way of playing the violin, whereby the instrument was no longer held under the chin, but lay freely on the shoulder; this was to have a crucial influence on the approach to the violin repertoire and was consequently adopted by many players starting in the early 1970s.

Sigiswald Kuijken was born in 1944 close to Brussels. He studied violin at the conservatories of Bruges and Brussels, completing his studies at the latter institution with Maurice Raskin in 1964. He came into contact with early music at a very young age, together with his brother Wieland. Studying on his own, he gained a thorough knowledge of specific 17th- and 18th-century performance techniques and conventions of interpretation on violin and viola da gamba This led to the introduction, in 1969, of a more authentic way of playing the violin, whereby the instrument was no longer held under the chin, but lay freely on the shoulder; this was to have a crucial influence on the approach to the violin repertoire and was consequently adopted by many players starting in the early 1970s.

«A mes yeux, cet enregistrement du requiem est incontounable, la sérénité qui s'en dégage, l'équilibre général, la qualité de l'interprétation tant vocale qu'instrumentale en font une version de premier plan, même si le choix est vaste, ma préférence est toujours restée pour cette version.»

Wolfgang Amadeus Mozart - Requiem in D minor for soloists, chorus and orchestra, KV 626
Le Petite Bande / Nedelands Kamerkoor / Sigiswald Kuijken
EAC+LOG+CUE | FLAC: 226 MB | Artwork | 5% Recovery Info
Label/Cat#: Accent # ACC 68645 D | Country/Year: Belgium 1987
Genre: Classical | Style: Viennese School, Sacred, Vocal

Belgian period instrument orchestra La Petite Bande takes its name and constitution from Lully's own orchestra at the court of Louis XIV. It was founded in 1972 by violinist and conductor Sigiswald Kuijken in order to record Lully's Le bourgeois gentilhomme with Gustav Leonhardt for Deutsche Harmonia Mundi. Although it had only been put together for a few recordings, it soon established a reputation as a leader in the performance of French Baroque music. La Petite Bande began giving regular concerts and appearing at festivals throughout the world. The orchestra's repertoire expanded to include music by Bach, Handel, Gluck, Haydn, and Mozart.

Today Antonio Caldara is not a name many would recognise let alone regard as one of the 'great' composers of the Baroque, yet during his own lifetime and long after his death he was held in high esteem by composers and theoreticians alike. Johann Sebastian Bach, for example is known to have made a copy of a Magnificat by Caldara to which he added a two-violin accompaniment to the "Suscepit Israel" section. According to Mattheson, Georg Philipp Telemann in his early years took Caldara as a model for his church and instrumental music. Franz Joseph Haydn, who was taken to Vienna by Georg Reutter, one of Caldara's pupils, sang many of his sacred works when he was a choirboy at St. Stephens and possessed copies of two of Caldara's Masses.

The death of Georg Philipp Telemann in 1767 paved the way for his godson, Carl Philipp Emanuel Bach to take up the position of Director of Music in Hamburg. Prior to that C P E Bach had been working for Frederick the Second of Prussia in Berlin but longed for a greater musical freedom and stylistic flexibility that working in Hamburg would offer him. This included the composition of three oratorios, including the one presented here. C P E Bach worked on The Resurrection and Ascension of Jesus in collaboration with the librettist Karl Wilhelm Ramler from 1781, and in 1787 it was published by Breitkopf. A letter from the composer to his publisher subsequently revealed he considered it to be one of his greatest masterpieces—a reflection agreed upon by audiences at the time, and succeeding generations of composers, including Haydn and Beethoven who both drew inspiration from it.

Franz Joseph Haydn - The Creation (Die Schopfung)
EAC RIP | WAVPACK + CUE + LOG | HQ Scans
NAXOS | Recorded: 2003 | Released: 2005
VokalEnsemble Koln - Capella Augustina - Andreas Spering

Although The Creation is no stranger to period-instrument performance, two in particular spring to mind as particularly outstanding. The first of these is Christopher Hogwood's on L'Oiseau-Lyre, which is in English and remains the only version to assemble the huge forces for which Haydn actually wrote, with singularly thrilling results. Second, there is Hengelbrock on Deutsche Harmonia Mundi, who demonstrated that at least on recordings the music can sound just as big and colorful, but without extensive doubling of instrumental parts. In his version of The Seasons, René Jacobs accomplished a similar feat, and so does this newcomer, even outdoing Hengelbrock in wringing every last drop of color from Haydn's perennially fresh orchestration. All of the other period performances, including Brüggen, Weil, Harnoncourt (twice), Kuijken, and Gardener, stand at some remove from these three.

Since it's founding in Freiburg in 1958, Deutsche Harmonia Mundi has been one of the most important and ambitious labels for period performances. Over decades, globally-acclaimed recordings were created with outstanding musicians. The limited edition "Deutsche Harmonia Mundi: 100 Great Recordings" contains 100 outstanding DHM recordings with some of the most important and best artists in their field: Nuria Rial, Dorothee Mields, Al Ayre Espanol, Hille Perl, Concentus Musicus Wien, Nikolaus Harnoncourt, the Freiburger Barockorchester, Skip Sempé, Capriccio Stravagante, La Petite Bande, Gustav Leonhardt, Andrew Lawrence-King, Frieder Bernius, the Balthasar-Neumann-Chor, Thomas Hengelbrock and many others.