Improvisata: Vivaldi, Sammartini, Boccherini, Monza, Demachi : Sinfonie con titoli - Fabio Biondi, Europa Galante

Improvisata

Vivaldi, Sammartini, Boccherini, Monza, Demachi : Sinfonie con titoli
Fabio Biondi, Europa Galante

01. Antonio Vivaldi : Sinfonia "Improvisata" : I. Allegro
02. II. Menuet - Allegro assai
03. Giovanni Battista Sammartini : Sinfonia in G minor : I. Allegro
04. II. Andante
05. III. Allegro
06. Carlo Monza : Sinfonia detta : " la tempesta di mare" : I. Allegro
07. II. Andante
08. III. Allegro assai
09. Luigi Boccherini : Sinfonia No.6 : "La casa del Diavolo" : I. Andante sostenuto
10. II. Allegro assai
11. III. Andantino con moto
12. IV. Andante sostenuto
13. V. Allegro con molto
14. Giuseppe Demachi : Sinfonia "Le campane di Roma" : I. Allegro assai
15. II. Andantino con moto
16. III. Presto

BBC : Radio 3 : Disc of the week : July 07 / 14 2007
npr.org : Best CDs of 2007
Scena org. : CD of the week April 18, 2007


Reviews :

Scena org : Norman Lebrecht : CD of the week April 18, 2007

The days when the early music revolution was run from London are long gone. The wildest tempi and edgiest sonorities are now being made by continental bands like Fabio BiondiA’s Europa Galante who take all bends at high speed and never look down. This job lot of titled symphonies by baroque writers are played hell for leather, without regard to the relative reputation of the listed composers. A Sinfonia by Vivaldi is little more than a manuscript scrap and SammartiniA’s is a salon piece, but the Boccherini symphony is dangerously dramatic and MonzaA’s Tempest Symphony stands up well to repeated hearing. Most dazzling of the lot is The Bells of Rome by Giuseppe Demachi, of whom little is known except that he may have led a band in London during the French Revolution and possibly died here in 1791. Totally diverting and not in the least bit profound, this is music for an early summerA’s evening, when the flutes interplay happy with the birds in the garden.

Also :

MusicWeb : Jonathan Woolf

This is a programme that might have been explicitly chosen to reveal the particular strengths of Europa Galante and Fabio Biondi. There have been times when I’ve tired of their playing to the gallery but here they settle down without any need to exaggerate since so many outsize gestures have already been embedded in these extrovert settings. The disc’s title is derived from the Vivaldi Sinfonia with which it begins and the descriptive (and imitative) is the conceptual core that runs throughout the recital.
The Vivaldi is actually a terse and brisk work lasting less than three and a half minutes. Its strong contrasts of colour and attack also seem briefly to point to some Eastern influence in the Allegro’s cadences. The bass line remains well upholstered and deftly pointed. As a concert overture it makes some powerful demands and opens the disc with deft incision. Sammartini’s Overture is another three-movement work, somewhat more expansive than Vivaldi’s explosive opener. The most distinctive feature of this highly attractive work is his advanced writing for the horns, a feature that dominates the opening Allegro. The engineers have balanced them very expertly indeed so they register with vigour – with a nice fat wet sound – without imperilling orchestral integrity. Similarly the horn harmonies are buoyantly suggestive in the expressive Andante where discreet string bow weight ensures clarity of articulation – still more so in the avuncular and rhythmically energised finale. So enamoured of this was Sammartini’s pupil, Gluck, that he appropriated the movement for a 1749 Serenade. This is a highly inventive and forward-looking work and the highlight of the collection.
Biondi has edited Monza’s Sinfonia and this likeable, affectionately songful work has a finely proportioned elegance. Fortunately it also possesses vitality and energy. Demachi’s Sinfonia bears the descriptive name Le campane di Roma – all bar the Sammartini bear names of some sort. There’s some excellent, elfin flute work here in the opening movement and sensitively judged horn-pizzicato exchanges in the stately Andantino. The most extensive and most popular work in the collection is the Boccherini. It receives a reading strong on imagination and eloquence. The pregnant and almost philosophically inclined trajectory of the opening Andante sostenuto serves early notice of the finesse of the playing. Biondi refuses to linger in the Andantino third movement properly taking it, as marked, con moto.
These are authoritative, intelligent and entirely successful performances. Their moments of fancy are integrated into the fabric of the compositions and never feel outsize or garish. Biondi and his band are on top interpretative form and have been accorded a first class acoustic and recording to boot.

Posted by Ice