Pan Flute Music

Despite Vivaldi’s impressive output of highly demanding solo concertos for 'flauto' or 'flautino' only one single sonata has survived. Nevertheless there is an overwhelming quantity of music which already was subject of many transformations during the famous “Red Priest’s” time. Traces of Vivaldi’s concertos, violin sonatas and even sacred music can be found in a collection of Six Sonatas by Ignazio Sieber, a German oboe and flute teacher at the Ospedale della Pietà.

After the success of the Vivaldiana CD, Michael Form and Dirk Börner continue their exploration of the Venetian repertoire for recorder with the present recording. The focus this time is Tomaso Albinoni, whose fame during his lifetime was spread far beyond the borders of Veneto and Italy. Even today it seems justified to name him in the same breath as Antonio Vivaldi, the rival star of the Venetian music scene of the early 18th Century.

Music is a universal language. It transcends linguistic and (most) cultural borders. Yet it is not nationless or without idiosyncrasies determined by place and local culture. There are, therefore, instruments which are more closely associated with a particular place than with another. This does not apply just to folk instruments (as the Scottish bagpipes, the Spanish guitar, or the Russian balalaika, to name but few) but also to instruments which are fully part of the “international” musical panorama and of the Classical Symphony Orchestra. Thus, the violin is by no means a “local” instrument; yet, there is a closeness between Hungarian/gipsy music and the violin which is lacking elsewhere. Similarly, the flute is as universal an instrument as there can be (it is probably the most common instrument in all epochs and cultures), but it has a privileged relationship with France.