Music Italy

This is one of the fine series of CDs which Christopher Page and his Gothic Voices made for Hyperion. The group were founded in 1980 and during the 1980s and 1990s made more than twenty recordings, starting with ‘A feather on the breath of God’ their influential and popular disc of music by Hildegard of Bingen.

In their survey of the trio sonata, London Baroque has already visited France, England and Germany and now arrives at the birthplace of the genre – Italy in the 17th Century. In this period, instrumental music was becoming important in its own right, and soon the violin was recognized as the ideal vehicle for this new style.

Trombone Grande: Music for bass sackbut around 1600 - Oltremontano, Wim Becu (2012) {Accent ACC 24263}
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© 2012 Accent | ACC 24263
Classical / Renaissance / Baroque / Chamber Music / Bass Trombone

Wim Becu plays on a bass trombone made in 1994, based on a 1640 instrument. No fanciful programs here. This is simply music emphasizing the bass sackbut, the so-called trombone grande , composed around 1600. It was at the time among the most popular of ceremonial instruments, both for noble and civic use, as numerous surviving inventories and payment schedules of the period attest. These things change, of course, and by the end of the 17th century the entire trombone family had faded away—not to reappear on the international stage until 100 years later, in a different role, associated with the tonal expansion of the modern orchestra. (Both Gluck and Mozart set the trombone to accompany Don Giovanni on his trip to hell, but the instrument had a two-way ticket.)

Volume 23 in the Hyperion Liszt series validates Liszt's phenomenal mastery of transcribing, and in the case of Berlioz's "Harold in Italy," translating an orchestral work with viola obbligato into a magnificent chamber work for piano and viola. The excellent content of Berlioz's work alone can easily earn five stars, but the other three substantial transcriptions of Gounod and Meyerbeer enhance the splendor of this recording even further.