These days it seems rare to come across a new recording of something
from the Baroque era which doesn’t fall under descriptive terms which
include the words lively, crisp or transparent. This being a live recording,
the term ‘lively’ is almost a literal one, and there is plenty
of animation in the playing throughout. Indeed, the tempi at times seem so
swift as to be headed for disaster, though everything is almost invariably
held together with spectacular virtuosity.
Gli Incogniti has a compact sound, but is quite a sizeable group
with a listing of 18 players in the booklet, corresponding to the core of
musicians which are known to have been connected with Corelli, as Amandine
Beyer states in the booklet, “deploying the golden splendours of the
harmony with all the power born of total commitment.” The sound has a
sparkling quality through a wealth of harpsichord notes which might have
been a bit too much of a good thing were it not that the instrument is,
quite correctly, fairly low in the recorded balance - supporting rhythm and
harmony while for the most part blending well with the strings. The
recording venue, the remarkable Arsenal de Metz hall, is nice and airy
without being overly swampy in terms of resonance. Amandine Beyer’s
solo parts emerge from the ensemble as an equal partner rather than being in
any way spot-lit, though the detail is easily sufficient to point out
contrast between the
concertino soloists and
ripieno - the
rest. Vibrato in the strings is held to a minimum in accepted authentic
style, though the playing is by no means without expression - dynamics and
drama more than carry Corelli’s musical messages, though the colour of
the sound remains that fairly chilly silver throughout.
There are numerous recordings of these works around, so where does
Gli Incogniti find itself in the rankings? For my personal taste they easily
replace the rather disappointing Cantilena and Adrian Shepherd on Chandos,
also pipping Capella Istropolitana from Naxos, which does however offer a
more beefy sounding alternative if you prefer a richer or warmer string
sound from modern instruments - the springy vibrato from the soloists not
however an advantage in these recordings. The Avison Ensemble on Linn is a
real contender (see
review) and on parity terms with this Zig-Zag release,
being a bit more relaxed sounding without losing much in terms of verve and
energy. What you will notice about Gli Incogniti’s set is that the
concerti are not placed in numerical order, and in fact
No. 1 appears
as last on CD 2. This works very well in this context, with a decent mixture
of pieces, the finale of disc one being the most famous ‘Christmas
Concerto’ performed in classy style and with plenty of affecting
tenderness and truly zippy fast movements. If you want to contrast in terms
of zippiness, the opening bars of the first movement in this concerto cover
about 9 seconds from Gli Incogniti compared to 16 seconds on Ensemble
415’s Harmonia Mundi recording, which has plenty of nice elements but
in this case is about as far from
vivace as you are likely to hear.
Each time I picked out a movement in this set I met nice surprises.
The opening of the
Concerto da Chiesa No. 2 in F major for instance,
the one which was such an inspiration to Tippett in his
Corelli
Fantasia,
has nice
diminuendi in the violin duet trills,
which also have perfectly synchronised
ritenuti. These are elements
of real character which keep everything alive and filled with novelty,
without becoming wearingly mannered.
All in all this is the kind of release which can solve all your
Corelli
Op. 6 problems in one go, and I for one don’t feel the
need to seek much further to have the best from this music. As far as being
‘live’, there are few if any detectable extraneous noises to
interfere with your enjoyment, though with three dates of patch sessions
owned up to I’m sure such any blemishes were rigorously excised. There
is some applause at the end of both discs however, which seems a bit
unnecessary but isn’t particularly sustained.
Dominy Clements
