y2k holiday listening
go for Baroque
by patricia hammond | december 1999
Classical Christmas (or, more properly, HOLIDAY) CD offerings have been abysmal this year.
Ill-advised, self-conscious crossover albums, cheesy and embarassing choral arrangements, reissues of the same old boys’ choirs doing the same old inoffensive carol schtick...there have been a couple of exceptions, but because the business of Christmas recordings is so high-profile, I won’t need to talk about them. They’ve either been in a paper, on the radio, or in a friend’s car stereo.
Personally--and of course that's what it always comes down to--what I find works best this time of year is CDs of Baroque music. They don’t even have to be on a Christmassy theme. All that’s required is that they be from around that era. After all, what is Handel’s Messiah? There’s a reason it’s so popular around now. Baroque has something buoyant, celebratory, satisfyingly crisp and yet emotionally genuine about it. The clear rhythms and the warm vigour in most Baroque music are so wonderful to stay indoors with when it’s cold, wet and dark everywhere else. It’s an escape from the pink and white plastic, fat men with cotton wool on their faces, the word “Shop,” and the irritating number “2000” that clutter so many areas we must walk through to get to work.
And when you think about it, aspects of the Baroque era are apparent in the whole idea of "holiday decorating." All those cherubs, ornate fixtures, ribbons, candles (which after all are what Christmas Lights represent), brocade, velvet...all those things that people use as a temporary distraction from the grey weather and their drab, spare, modern living spaces. A bit of sunshine and the Television usually suffice for the rest of the year, it seems.
As recordings go, I tend to like my Baroque music to have a bit of a punch to it; the crisp, rhythmic way of the best of the new Authentic Performance brigade.
Having said that, I must state that the "old" way of playing Bach and Vivaldi is something I wouldn’t be without. Klemperer pounding out the St. Matthew Passion as if it were Wagner, using quadruple the amount of players and singers as Bach would have had, and instruments he wouldn’t have recognised, is quite an experience. It’s a slow wallow; at its best, monumental, and to me it’s like eating something that tastes amazing, but takes a long time to chew, and will make a person fat. I would also never part with Wilhelm Furtwangler’s Berlin Philharmonic recording of Bach’s famous Air from Suite No. 3, where the string players have no conventions to prevent them from making the most of all the sensuality their instruments can offer, and Wilhelm demonstrates how much dramatic tension something that slow can have from beginning to end. Mmmmmmmmm. That’s like melted chocolate. (The latter is on a Koch CD entitled “Bach: From Authentic to Outrageous”)
However, the “Authentic Performance” guys have shown us a springier, leaner, and often, more energetic way, with smaller groups playing instruments that are replicas of what would have been used at the time. So--gut strings instead of steel, wooden instead of metal flutes, and brass instruments with less (or no) valves. Just give a listen to Nicholas Harnoncourt’s recording of Handel’s Water Music. Those hunting horns sure give it a different flavour, don’t they? To complement the instruments and the size of the ensembles, Authenticists choose singers who aren’t necessarily opera singers, but who can alter their vibrato and timbre to suit whatever instruments they’re paired with, and blend if need be. Nicholas Harnoncourt went so far as to give soprano arias to boys! With the advent of these historically-informed stylists came the vogue of Emma Kirkby’s pure voice, and sopranos the world over are still copying her.
Authenticist conductors and their tight little ensembles tend to demonstrate quicksilver flexibility of tempo and dynamics-- one could say, in the same way that smaller cars can go faster around tight corners.
We live in a golden age for Authentic Baroque performance. We have virtuosos of the Baroque violin like Andrew Manze (pronounced Manzee), Fabio Biondi and Rachel Podger; gorgeously perfect choral groups conducted by such inspired leaders as Philippe Herreweghe, Marc Minkowski, Paul McCreesh, Ton Koopman and Masaaki Suzuki; a smorgasbord of countertenors, and ensembles like Concerto Koln, Akademie fur Alte Musik Berlin, and Les Musiciens du Louvre who are, every member of them, masters of their instruments. New names are cropping up all the time.
One new release, just in time to counteract the gloomy season, is Handel’s lively choral work "Dixit Dominus" on DG’s early music sub-label, Archiv. I’m really excited about this one. The precision and sense of fun these people come up with in every moment of this disc make it a special occasion. Marc Minkowski, who started out as an excellent Early Music Bassoonist, leads his Musiciens du Louvre with palpable enjoyment and energy, and in a couple of solo motets he features two of the best female voices in Early Music today. Annick Massis has a soprano voice of many colours, and laserbeam accuracy. In the upper reaches of her range it positively gleams with intensity. I remember hearing her not so long ago on a recording with the same group and conductor in Handel’s “Risurrezione.” In a solo that makes the whole thing worth getting, she sings some death-defying coloratura at a speed that caused a few hearers to ask if that was really a human being.
Magdalena Kozena is a Czech mezzo who has a loyal following wherever she goes. At 26(!) her voice is, I think, exactly what the world wants: velvety-smooth, with the purity and lightness of a countertenor combined with the warmth and femininity of a female alto. Released at the same time as the “Dixit Dominus” is a CD entirely devoted to Bach arias, all sung seductively by Kozena, also on Archiv.
Speaking of Bach (again), the above label has seen fit to assemble a compilation of the most popular choruses from some of the cantatas and the two Passions, all with John Eliot Gardiner and his Monteverdi Choir. If you want to introduce yourself to this stuff, or just have the choruses all together, it’s a good thing to have. Well put together, and 100% great music.
Harmonia Mundi has just issued a generous Bach sampler. It’s two CDs, with plenty of interesting things to go along with the more familiar. This is a label that I find produces recordings of a consistently high standard, and this is evident here. The two CDs are sold for the price of one, packaged neatly together.
In a nice gesture, the same company have made their dazzling recording of Bach’s violin concertos with Andrew Manze, Rachel Podger and the Akademie fur Alte Musik Berlin available at a temporary low price--one could say, a budget price. I have yet to run across someone who doesn’t like this CD.
I’ve spoken gushingly of Fabio Biondi’s Vivaldi recordings on the Opus 111 label (and the one on EMI’s Virgin Veritas), and I’d like to add that Archangelo Corelli wrote enough “Concerti Grossi” (like a concerto, only with different sized groups of instruments interacting instead of one soloist and an orchestra) to fill two discs. Fabio’s recorded them. The works are just as captivating as Vivaldi’s concerti, and the performances here can hardly be bettered, as they love to say in the British review journals.
And in the same vein, Josef Heinechen’s “Concerti Grandi” (like Concerti Grossi) are given lively treatment by Musica Antiqua Koln on Archiv. There is some wonderful woodwind playing on this one. I once recommended this CD to a man who had come in to buy some baroque music beacause he had lost his job as a truck driver and was going back to school. He had heard that Baroque music was a study aid. To his surprise, he loved this recording so much that from then on he’s been a regular customer. Until Heinechin, he had never listened to “Classical” music in his life.
A gorgeous new release on ECM is Zelenka’s Trio Sonatas. A smaller group than any of the above, these pieces are performed by one oboe, one violin, one bassoon, one double bass and a harpsichord. The players are truly top-notch, and if the music is new to you, you’ll be happy you discovered it. Who needs Pachelbel’s Canon when you’ve got these haunting slow movements? It’s two full-priced discs, but you’ll thank me.
Vivaldi’s classic choral work, the “Gloria,” is a must. The one on L’Oiseau-Lyre with Preston is my fave, with the best soloists, a boys’ choir that does everything boys’ choirs were made for, and all that good stuff. This is another one that nobody ever dislikes.
Recently Supercountertenor Andreas Scholl, light lyric soprano Barbara Bonney and Les Talens Lyrics led by Christophe Rousset recorded Pergolesi’s Stabat Mater. This is a totally self-indulgent recording. Everyone is revelling in their timbre...it’s hard to disagree with this approach when the sounds are, really, so good. In addition, Scholl and Bonney each get a solo Salve Regina to show off more ravishing tones.
In order for me to get back to the serious business of sitting around hating ChristmasTM, I’ll finish off with one more recommendation: Paul McCreesh’s recording of what he calls an Epiphany Mass, as it would have been heard in Bach's day, with church bells, organ pieces, chorale singing, and a couple of Johann Sebastian Bach's cantatas and a short Mass. This CD has a sense of occasion that will take you right out of your everyday existence. And really, that's why I'm listening to this stuff around about now.
 | Patricia is a classically trained mezzo who now lives and works in the UK. For more information about her, visit patriciahammond.com. |
