BOCCHERINI: Guitar Quintets, Vol. 2

It may or may not be purely coincidental that this third volume in Naxos’s issue of the complete Boccherini Cello Concertos has been released in the year that marks the 200th anniversary of the composer’s death. Whatever the case, this new recording, featuring an entirely different soloist and orchestra from the previous volumes, should not disappoint collectors of the entire cycle. Raphael Wallfisch proves to be a most stylish and sympathetic performer. He has the necessary technical armoury to cope with the fearsomely difficult writing in each concerto, but also delivers a wonderfully expressive melodic line in the slow movements. Throughout Wallfisch plays his own cadenzas which are free from Romantic bluster and empty virtuosity. The partnership with the Northern Chamber Orchestra works very well, though the reverberant and muddy recording does not always serve the music to its best advantage. While the rather heavy bass line seems apposite for movements such as the Maestoso of the C major Concerto, it appears to undermine the lightness and wit of the rondo finale of the well-known B flat Concerto, and makes some of the slow movements sound more lugubrious than one might have expected. Performance: 5 (out of 5), Sound: 5 (out of 5)

-- Erik Levi, BBC Music Magazine

This delightful disc presents absolutely first-rate performances of chamber music that deserves to be much better known. There are two reasons that Boccherini's music hasn't worn as well as Haydn's or Mozart's. First, his prevailing mode of gentle graciousness precludes the kind of emotional depth and drama that the two Viennese masters routinely write into their instrumental music. Second (and related to the first point), Boccherini writes marvelously varied expositions--witness the C major (Op. 32 No. 4) quartet's opening Allegro bizzarro--but uneventful developments. In short, his music isn't as well sustained or as purposeful as Haydn's or Mozart's, but it's also not as lengthy or ambitious, so within its given parameters there's some wonderful writing, and the Quartetto Borciani plays these quartets for all they're worth. In particular, they characterize the opening movements with as much gusto as the music can take. Even the initial Allegro comodo of the tepidly genial G minor quartet (Op. 32 No. 5) moves purposefully forward, while the same work's final Capriccio ad libitum captures the players (and the composer) in full fantastic flight. By contrast, slow movements are marvelously sustained and possess a genuinely Italianate singing tone--as in the heavenly and impressively large-scale Adagio from the D major quartet (Op. 32 No. 3). In sum, you won't easily hear a more persuasive case being made for this music, and Naxos' sonics are top-drawer. Come and explore! --David Hurwitz, ClassicsToday.com

Boccherini is a leading figure in the history of music that preceded the advent of the first Viennese School; his contribution to the development of the quartet and quintet form was decisive and its importance is acknowledged by both Italian and foreign scholars. His music stands out for its freshness and melodic variety and for the refined and elegant ideas, in a harmonious discursive flow. Boccherini wrote two versions of the Stabat Mater: a first one in 1781 for soprano and strings (the one contained in this album) and a second one in 1800 for soprano, alto, tenor and strings, which entered the repertoire and was made, according to a note by the author reported on the manuscript copy of the Paris Conservatoire, "to avoid the monotony of a single voice and too much work for this single singing voice". Nevertheless, he writes a page of sincere and pure religious feeling that in the final AMEN touches one of the most inspiring moments of his creative personality. The masterful performance of the Sanremo Symphony Orchestra, conducted by Maestro Giancarlo De Lorenzo, and the convincing prayerful interpretation of the soprano Gabriella Costa, make this recording a sure reference in the discography of Boccherini's works.

"[This disc] offers a slightly odd but still very enjoyable selection of Boccherini—timed, no doubt, for the 250th anniversary this year. The two symphonies are late works, the D major a single-movement piece of the Italian overture type, with a slow movement embedded, the C minor his most 'symphonic' work in the Viennese-classical sense of the term. Jeanne Lamon directs lively performances with this excellent Canadian group. The D major she takes rather quickly, producing that sense of tension that arises when music is pushed a little beyond its natural pace; but the effect is energetic and inspiriting (and it is marked con molto spirito). The Andantino is more relaxed, its colours happily realized. In the C minor work she presses the minuet too much, I think (true, it's marked Allegro), for it to make its points properly, but the fine first movement is direct and unaffected, and its close symphonic argument comes across well, while the finale is splendidly fiery.

Anner Bylsma plays the two concertos, neither of them among the better known of Boccherini's, in characteristic fashion, dashing into the music with his usual sense of fresh discovery and uninhibited enthusiasm. Some might prefer more measured performances, but the intensity of his involvement does draw the listener in, and his bouncing rhythms show an infectious pleasure in the music. The odd rough moment is a modest price to pay. He takes both the slow movements very slowly, surprisingly so, for this runs against the grain of fashion, not to say informed opinion, in the early music world. That of the D major is however rapt in expression, with Bylsma's eloquent line (the phrases in rapid notes are thrown off like little sprigs of decoration) and Tafelmusik's soft and sensitive accompaniment. The C major is a less impressive piece and there must be some doubt about its complete authenticity, at least in this form (who ever heard of a concerto in C with a slow movement in D?); Bylsma contributes some curious, almost trumpet-like tone in the first movement, and plays an extremely odd cadenza.

In fact, the work I enjoyed most of all, and for which I shall treasure this CD in particular, is the Octet, one of a group of late chamber works for mixed combinations which haven't been, but should be, available on records. It is a charming and leisurely piece, exquisitely scored, with one of those seductive minuets bearing Boccherini's most personal stamp—exquisitely scored, gently witty, with a hint of nostalgia and pain lurking somewhere behind the notes. That, at any rate, is how I hear it, and I find it wholly beguiling."

-- Stanley Sadie, Gramophone [7/1993]

This is a winner of a disc, the first of a projected series covering all 12 of Boccherini’s cello concertos, beautifully performed on modern instruments but with concern for period practice and superbly recorded. One minor snag is a confusion over numbering. Naxos calls its first selection of works Nos. 1-4, whereas in Gramophone and on the Gramophone Database the new numbering above is used. What many collectors will be concerned about is the Boccherini Cello Concerto beloved of generations in Grutzmacher’s corrupt edition.

When many years ago I questioned Jacqueline du Pre about choosing it for her recording, she promptly justified herself, saying, ‘But the slow movement is so lovely.’ She was quite right, as her classic recording makes clear (EMI, 10/67), but that movement was transferred from another work, in fact No. 7 in G, one of the four works here. Tim Hugh’s dedicated account of this lovely G minor movement is a high spot of this issue, with rapt, hushed playing not just from the soloist but also from the excellent Scottish Chamber Orchestra under Anthony Halstead. It develops into a long cadenza, a sustained meditation lasting almost two minutes out of the six-and-a-half, and I should have liked to have it identified in the notes.

As it is, Hugh offers substantial cadenzas not just in the first movements of each work, but in slow movements and finales too, though none is as extended as the one in the G minor slow movement. Halstead, as a period specialist and a horn virtuoso as well as a conductor, matches his soloist in the dedication of these performances, clarifying textures (not least in the ripe horn parts, presumably played on natural instruments) and encouraging Hugh to choose speeds on the fast side, with easily flowing slow movements and outer movements which test the soloist’s virtuosity to the very limit, without sounding breathless.

The formula in all four works is similar, even though each has its individual delights, with strong, foursquare first movements, slow movements that sound rather Handelian and galloping finales in triple time. Not just for those who know only the old Grutzmacher concerto, all this will be a delightful discovery. And remember, there are two more issues to come.

-- Edward Greenfield, Gramophone [10/1999]