John Holloway

Bach's first biographer, Forkel, noted that the violin writing of the Sonatas, BWV1014-19 required a master to play it. Bach, he said, knew all the possibilities of the instrument sparing it as little as he spared the harpsichord. Tie significant departure from baroque custom in these six sonatas is Bach's treatment of the harpsichord as an obbligato instrument, thereby making both players responsible for the thematic development. John Holloway and Davitt Moroney have set up a musically rewarding partnership in these brilliantly inventive works, furthermore adding to their programme the two lovely sonatas for violin and continuo long attributed to Bach, and justly so. In both of them they are joined by Susan Sheppard (continuo cello).

John Holloway and Davitt Moroney have set up a musically rewarding partnership in these brilliantly inventive works, furthermore adding to their programme the two lovely sonatas for violin and continuo long attributed to Bach, and justly so. In both of them they are joined by Susan Sheppard (continuo cello). For these sonatas Moroney has preferred a chamber organ to a harpsichord.

John Dowland’s Lachrimae Pavans is considered one of the greatest works in the canon of English chamber music. Based upon his famous song “Flow My Teares”, the seven pavans – "Seaven Teares", as Dowland called them – present an extraordinary exploration of the contrapuntal and harmonic possibilities offered by the theme. In this remarkable recording, baroque violinist John Holloway creates a concert programme around the lachrimae Pavans. Threaded between Dowland’s masterpieces are works of other major composers of his era – Henry Purcell, William Lawes, John Jenkins, Thomas Morley and Matthew Locke. In bringing together these works of strongly contrasting colour and character Holloway and company give us a vivid sense of the great flowering of consort music which took place in England in the 17th century.

After a programme of works thematically spun around Renaissance composer John Dowland’s Lachrimae Pavans (ECM 2189), violinist John Holloway and his ensemble now devote their art to Baroque composer Henry Purcell’s “fantazias”. Commenting on the fantasias in his detailed liner note, Holloway remarks how “it is tempting to see their brilliant distillation of the very best of Byrd, Lawes, Jenkins and Locke as a personal farewell to a kind of music, which in Purcell’s own chamber music would soon be superseded by sonatas.” Purcell’s fantasias are regarded as some of the finest and most intricately wrought works in the genre, embracing profound counterpoint and a great command of all of the polyphonal techniques of the time. Holloway and the ensemble’s reading of the three- and four-part fantasias offers deep insight into the compositions’ fabric, revealing a fresh perspective of a composer with, as Holloway notes, “an extraordinary ability to walk the fine line between joy and sorrow, to beautifully express the melancholy which was such a characteristic mood of his times.”

John Holloway’s recital of mid 17th century music mines the rich sonic possibilities of a highly unusual instrumental combination: baroque violin with basso continuo provided by harpsichord and organ played simultaneously by two musicians, both realising the figured bass to the full harmonic, contrapuntal and rhythmic potential of their instruments. Aloysia Assenbaum and Lars Ulrik Mortensen brilliantly support Holloway’s exhilarating account of Bertali’s "Chiacona" and move with him through the mysteries of Schmelzer’s "Sonatae Unarum Fidium".

Johann Heinrich Schmelzer - Sonatae Unarum Fidium (1664)
(+ Bertali - Chiacona a violino solo, Anon. - Sonata for scordatura violin and b. c.)
Classical, Baroque | 1 CD | EAC | FLAC, CUE, LOG | Scans | 349 MB | Rapidshare
Recorded: Dec. 1997, Kloster Fischingen, Switzerland | Released: 1999 | Label: ECM N. S. 1668 | TT: 63:08
John Holloway - violin | Aloysia Assenbaum - organ | Lars Ulrik Mortensen - harpsichord, organ

John Holloway's recital of mid 17th century music mines the rich sonic possibilities of a highly unusual instrumental combination: baroque violin with basso continuo provided by harpsichord and organ played simultaneously by two musicians, both realising the figured bass to the full harmonic, contrapuntal and rhythmic potential of their instruments. Aloysia Assenbaum and Lars Ulrik Mortensen brilliantly support Holloway's exhilarating account of Bertali's "Chiacona" and move with him through the mysteries of Schmelzer's "Sonatae Unarum Fidium". (ecmrecords.com)

These two discs contain Leclair's 12 sonatas for two unaccompanied violins en duo. He produced them in two sets of six, the earlier one, Op. 3, dating from 1730, the later one from 1747-9. Barely a handful have previously been recorded, so these new issues make an important addition to the baroque catalogue. Leclair more than any of his French contemporaries implemented the technical developments in violin playing which were taking place in Italy in the hands of the post-Corelli generation.

Biber's 15 Mystery Sonatas with their additional Passacaglia for unaccompanied violin were written in about 1678 and dedicated to his employer, the Archbishop of Salzburg. Each Sonata is inspired by a section of the Rosary devotion of the Catholic Church which offered a system of meditation on 15 Mysteries from the lives of Jesus and the Virgin Mary. The music isn't, strictly speaking, programmatic, though often vividly illustrative of events which took place in the life of Christ.