MusicWeb International One of the most grown-up review sites around 2023
Approaching 60,000 reviews
and more.. and still writing ...

Search MusicWeb Here Acte Prealable Polish CDs
 

Presto Music CD retailer
 
Founder: Len Mullenger                                    Editor in Chief:John Quinn             


CD REVIEW

Some items
to consider

new MWI
Current reviews

old MWI
pre-2023 reviews

paid for
advertisements

Acte Prealable Polish recordings

Forgotten Recordings
Forgotten Recordings
All Forgotten Records Reviews

TROUBADISC
Troubadisc Weinberg- TROCD01450

All Troubadisc reviews


FOGHORN Classics

Alexandra-Quartet
Brahms String Quartets

All Foghorn Reviews


All HDTT reviews


Songs to Harp from
the Old and New World


all Nimbus reviews



all tudor reviews


Follow us on Twitter


Editorial Board
MusicWeb International
Founding Editor
   
Rob Barnett
Editor in Chief
John Quinn
Contributing Editor
Ralph Moore
Webmaster
   David Barker
Postmaster
Jonathan Woolf
MusicWeb Founder
   Len Mullenger


Buy through MusicWeb for £11.50 postage paid World-wide.

 

Musicweb Purchase button

 

Antonio FERRADINI (1718-1779)
Six Sonatas for Harpsichord  (c.1760) [78:39]
Silvia Rambaldi (harpsichord)
rec. Studio Monari, July 2007 
TACTUS TC 713101 [78:29]

Experience Classicsonline

 

Ferradini was born in Naples in 1718 where he studied. He journeyed to Parma and to Madrid and then in around 1760 to Prague. Though his works were quite widely performed there and elsewhere – not least in Germany – he died a pauper in his adopted city’s Italian hospital.

A number of his operas are extant though frustratingly libretti only – a few isolated arias survive – and a number of his works were still being performed many years after his death, so that his music didn’t simply disappear overnight. Of these works his Stabat Mater is probably the best remembered and as Alberto Iesuč reminds us in his sleeve notes an edition was reprinted in Milan in 1969.

But he is also remembered for instrumental works and for these harpsichord sonatas in particular, which are preserved in Dresden and which are conjecturally dated to c.1760, the time of the composer’s relocation to Prague. Iesuč is quite right to dissociate them from the grandly virtuosic works of Domenico Scarlatti with which they have little in common. They are clearly of the Stile Galante and strongly resonant of the prevailing orthodoxies in the French and Italian styles. That said however these – in the main – four movement sonatas (slow-fast-slow-fast) have plenty of harmonic and lyrical interest and are imbued with Ferradini’s prevailing sense of melancholy and it’s this that generates perhaps the most permanent interest in these expertly wrought and diverting works.

Silvia Rambaldi writes eloquently on matters of performance and she puts her words into practice with playing of assurance and intelligence. The second movement of the First Sonata for instance is played with considerable vitality, its tutti/soli sections clearly delineated and with cadenzas interpolated on the fermatas on the final note of a phrase. Her exploration of the extensive Larghetto sostenuto reveals its expressive depth quite clearly. Staccati and repeated notes are distinguishing features of the third movement of the second sonata, the finale of which is a vigorous and emphatic Allegro grazioso. His instinct for plangency and expressive contour can also be gauged by the richness of the Andantino amoroso of No.3, a work graced by Rambaldi’s deft articulation in the minuet and the élan of the finale.

The French style Prelude of No.4 is a preface to the plays of registers in the Allegro and the plaintive beauty of the Andante grazioso. Auspicious too is the feathery lightness of the lute registration in the finale. The Sixth sonata is the only one to break the four-movement convention; it sports seven. There’s a stately air to the opening with fine embellishments, a lovely left hand melody line and very effective mini cadenzas in the second movement Allegro. The Tempo giusto has a brief fugal flourish and there’s a terrifically engaging and long Minuet with variations followed by a hunt movement. Dance and hunt themes are used with sure appreciation and a stylistic unity.

Throughout Rambaldi’s editorial decision-making sounds spot-on and she responds amply to the melancholia as well as to the vitality inherent in these charming and highly effective works. Fine sound and comprehensive notes add to the lustre.

Jonathan Woolf
 

Tactus Catalogue



 


Advertising on
Musicweb


Donate and keep us afloat

 

New Releases

Naxos Classical
All Naxos reviews

Hyperion recordings
All Hyperion reviews

Foghorn recordings
All Foghorn reviews

Troubadisc recordings
All Troubadisc reviews



all Bridge reviews


all cpo reviews

Divine Art recordings
Click to see New Releases
Get 10% off using code musicweb10
All Divine Art reviews


All Eloquence reviews

Lyrita recordings
All Lyrita Reviews

 

Wyastone New Releases
Obtain 10% discount

Subscribe to our free weekly review listing

 

 


EXPLORE MUSICWEB INTERNATIONAL

Making a Donation to MusicWeb

Writing CD reviews for MWI

About MWI
Who we are, where we have come from and how we do it.

Site Map

How to find a review

How to find articles on MusicWeb
Listed in date order

Review Indexes
   By Label
      Select a label and all reviews are listed in Catalogue order
   By Masterwork
            Links from composer names (eg Sibelius) are to resource pages with links to the review indexes for the individual works as well as other resources.

Themed Review pages

Jazz reviews

 

Discographies
   Composer
      Composer surveys
   National
      Unique to MusicWeb -
a comprehensive listing of all LP and CD recordings of given works
.
Prepared by Michael Herman

The Collector’s Guide to Gramophone Company Record Labels 1898 - 1925
Howard Friedman

Book Reviews

Complete Books
We have a number of out of print complete books on-line

Interviews
With Composers, Conductors, Singers, Instumentalists and others
Includes those on the Seen and Heard site

Nostalgia

Nostalgia CD reviews

Records Of The Year
Each reviewer is given the opportunity to select the best of the releases

Monthly Best Buys
Recordings of the Month and Bargains of the Month

Comment
Arthur Butterworth Writes

An occasional column

Phil Scowcroft's Garlands
British Light Music articles

Classical blogs
A listing of Classical Music Blogs external to MusicWeb International

Reviewers Logs
What they have been listening to for pleasure

Announcements

 

Community
Bulletin Board

Give your opinions or seek answers

Reviewers
Past and present

Helpers invited!

Resources
How Did I Miss That?

Currently suspended but there are a lot there with sound clips


Composer Resources

British Composers

British Light Music Composers

Other composers

Film Music (Archive)
Film Music on the Web (Closed in December 2006)

Programme Notes
For concert organizers

External sites
British Music Society
The BBC Proms
Orchestra Sites
Recording Companies & Retailers
Online Music
Agents & Marketing
Publishers
Other links
Newsgroups
Web News sites etc

PotPourri
A pot-pourri of articles

MW Listening Room
MW Office

Advice to Windows Vista users  
Questionnaire    
Site History  
What they say about us
What we say about us!
Where to get help on the Internet
CD orders By Special Request
Graphics archive
Currency Converter
Dictionary
Magazines
Newsfeed  
Web Ring
Translation Service

Rules for potential reviewers :-)
Do Not Go Here!
April Fools




Return to Review Index

Untitled Document


Reviews from previous months
Join the mailing list and receive a hyperlinked weekly update on the discs reviewed. details
We welcome feedback on our reviews. Please use the Bulletin Board
Please paste in the first line of your comments the URL of the review to which you refer.