English harpsichordist Gilbert Rowland has completed the third volume in his ongoing series of the complete Suites for Harpsichord by Johann Jakob Froberger. The album was recorded at Holy Trinity Church, Weston, Hertfordshire on 11-14 July 2022, with engineer John Taylor who produced all of Gilbert’s previous Divine Art and Athene recordings. The first two volumes of the series has attracted much praise from critics for its "glorious sound" and "energy and a good forward drive" of Rowland's playing.

Johann Jakob Froberger was a highly accomplished composer of the middle Baroque period and credited with inventing the ‘baroque suite’ used with variations by Bach, Handel and countless other composers. He was extremely prolific and several of his works, including the Harpsichord Suites, have been discovered recently.

Gilbert Rowland first studied the harpsichord with Millicent Silver. He made his debut at Fenton House in 1970 and first appeared at the Wigmore Hall in 1973. He has made numerous recordings of works by Scarlatti, Soler, Rameau and
Fischer which have received considerable acclaim from the national press. He joined Divine Art in 2010 to record the harpsichord suites by Handel, followed by those of Froberger and Mattheson and was assigned to Divine Art’s specialist
early music label, Athene.

The decades around 1600 bore witness to the flourishing of a remarkable musical tradition: the art of diminution, in which simple melodies were given exquisitely virtuosic embellishments, effectively creating new works. One such creation, Francesco Rognoni’s ornamentation of Palestrina’s Io son ferito, was captioned ‘con arte e maestria’ – with art and mastery – referring to the consummate craftsmanship displayed in its invention and performance. Giving new life to this tradition was the inspiration for this unique programme: alongside iconic works from the diminution canon, Monteverdi String Band members Oliver Webber and Steven Devine present newly ornamented versions of a selection of sixteenth- and early-seventeenth-century works.

One of the most prominent Bohemian composers working in Vienna during the late 18th and early 19th centuries, Leopold Kozeluch was a prolific composer of instrumental music including seventeen symphonies. They are notable for mellifluous themes, sophisticated structures and, at times, a lyricism that seems to foreshadow the youthful works of Schubert. This unique recording draws on the original sources and corrects a number of mistakes encountered in previously published versions. This second volume of the complete edition of the symphonies of Leopold Kozeluch follows a first that was released in March 2017 and given a 9/9 score by ClassicsToday.com with plaudits for both conductor and orchestra: “Marek Stilec leads lively, smartly paced performances, and gets fine playing from the ensemble.”

The 6 sonatas for violin and harpsichord obbligato rank amongst the most beautiful chamber music that Bach wrote. They are overshadowed by the solo sonatas. This despite the fact that they are masterpieces in their own right, only without the aura of a magnum opus. The slow movements display a range of moods, from desolate and lonely to radiantly festive. Meanwhile, the fast movements are a mixture of high-spirited instrumental music and contrapuntal mastery. There are canons, fugues, chorale preludes and much more: practically a compendium of options. Daniel Gaede and Raphael Alpermann guide us through this treasure trove of curiosities with virtuosity and sensitivity. Once again: 2 albums for the price of one.

The rationale of the programme presented by the Labirinto Armonico Ensemble is of a purely geographic nature: it offers a selection of works by three composers who were active in very different contexts between the beginning of the seventeenth century and the end of the eighteenth, but were united by the fact that they were all three natives of Abruzzi. Michele Mascitti, prominent violinist and composer, played a fundamental role in spreading the Italian style in France, making his fortune in Paris where he carried out his musical career; from there his fame extended to England and the Netherlands. Fedele Fenaroli, on the other hand, was a very important teacher and appreciated by Giuseppe Verdi for his treaty on the “Partimenti.” Giacomo Fornaci is the oldest of the three composers, of which only the collection of arias from included in this album have survived.

This album allows us to appreciate the versatility of the young performer Anna Urpina, whose goal has been to approach each score from a historically informed perspective. The compositions of c. XVII and XVIII (Castello, Biber, Corelli and Telemann) are recorded with Baroque violin (with gut strings) and bow next to the harpsichord. In addition, the tuning is half a tone lower (415 Hz) than is usually used in the current repertoire (442 Hz). Period techniques have also been put into practice, as well as Baroque flexibility in ornamentation and improvisation. Summoning a single key instrument to give life to the basso continuo allows us to compare in a more direct way the works belonging to the two historical periods, since the scores of c. XX and XXI (Webern, Pärt, José Luis Turina and Guix) are performed with modern violin and piano. In fact, following this idea of highlighting to the maximum the contrasts and constants that relate the eight compositions, the pieces have been ordered by combining one of each period instead of following a chronological order, thus generating quite a stimulating hybrid narration. An original proposal which highlights the sophisticated sound and artistic potential of the “four-chord lyre”, as Biber used to call the violin.

The city of Modena, under the rule of the Este family, was the capital of the Dukedom of Modena e Reggio. Thanks to Duke Francesco ii’s fondness for the violin, music became an essential element in the most important events at the Este court, such as receptions, weddings and official visits of foreign sovereigns. These were the occasions in which the Duke displayed all his magnificence. Modena stands out for the abundance of its collection of musical documents in the Biblioteca Estense: the library is a real mine, largely unexplored so far. This consideration gave rise to the idea of making this beautiful, extraordinarily modern music available to those who are “pursuing” culture and art. So our goal is to promote a rediscovery of the enormous heritage preserved in the Biblioteca Estense, by carrying out a meticulous study of the sources of the works of the composers who were active at the Este Court in Modena, transcribing them into modern notation and critical editions, and producing monographic recordings of them. The first step consisted in the study and recording of the instrumental works of Giovanni Battista Vitali. The twelve sonatas op. 9 from 1684, for two violins and basso continuo, typically meant to be performed in a church, unfortunately have not survived in print, but only in manuscript form. Moreover the manuscript is not very well preserved, and in some points the paper has been irreparably damaged by time, so some passages are illegible. We have carried out a painstaking work of checking and reconstructing – only where we considered it indispensable – and in some points, even if the result is not particularly harmonious or formally correct, we have chosen to accept what history has handed down to us: loose scores, sometimes not devoid of certain mistakes that typically occur in versions that have not yet been printed by some publisher.