Pieter Hellendaal (1721-1799)
Six Grand Concertos, Op. 3 (publ. 1758)
La Sfera Armoniosa/Mike Fentross
rec. live, 7 October 2021, St Laurenskerk, Rotterdam, The Netherlands
CHALLENGE CLASSICS CC72911 [80]
I was going to write that I hadn’t heard of Pieter Hellendaal before requesting this release for review. However, on searching the MWI site, I found that we published two reviews of a recording of his Cambridge sonatas in 2020, which means that they definitely crossed my desk. So let me revise that to not having heard any of his music.
You can read a more thorough biography in Johan van Veen’s review (review), but a very quick precis has him born in Rotterdam, given a musical education by his father, and becoming the organist for his local church at the age of ten. In his late teens, he studied in Padua with the great violinist Tartini, before returning to his native country to forge a career as violinist and composer. In 1751, he moved his family to London, following in the footsteps of Handel and Geminiani, where he made a reasonable living as performer and teacher. However, he could not gain any permanent positions in the capital, and in 1762, became organist at Pembroke Hall Chapel in Cambridge, where he would spend the rest of his life.
This set of concertos, his only known orchestral works, was written and published during his time in London, and shows the unmistakeable fingerprints of Corelli, Handel and Geminiani. To an extent, they are somewhat anachronistic, when you consider that Handel’s opp. 3 & 6 sets were written in the 1730s, and by 1758, Haydn was just starting to write the first of his symphonies. Nevertheless, they are valuable additions to the body of 18th century works of this type, with some interesting and enjoyable individual touches, such as the inclusion of marches – really splendid ones – to finish Concertos 3 and 5. They may not be up to the level of Corelli’s and Handel’s sets, but are certainly as good (or possibly better) than Geminiani’s. There are lovely moments dotted through the thirty-one movements. I have already mentioned the two marches, so let me add the Alle breve from Concerto 3 and the Pastorale that closes No. 4 as other highlights.
La Sfera Armoniosa was formed in 1992. This is their second release in a series on Challenge Classics aimed at discovering hidden Dutch treasures of the 17th and 18th centuries. The first was devoted to the music of Willem de Fesch, and was well received (review). Interestingly, two reservations expressed about that release by the reviewer – a lack of tracking for individual movements and the effect of a non-church acoustic on the sound – have both been addressed in this release. I am very impressed by La Sfera Armoniosa; they don’t use extreme tempos to create an impression. It is very stylish playing that is perfect for this music. There are other recordings of these works in the catalogue, one from 1992 featuring Andrew Manze and Roy Goodman on Chanel Classics. I haven’t attempted to track any of them down, but very much doubt that they would be any better than these new performances.
That there is an audience present for these performances is impossible to discern until the very end, when there is thirty-plus seconds of applause, but it commences well after the final note is played. The sound quality is very good, and the five pages in the booklet on Hellendaal and the works are as much as any could want. The extended coverage of the players (eight pages) that was noted in the previous review is repeated here.
I expected this to be a pleasant but unmemorable recording, but found it getting better and better as I listened. I would say that was due in part to Hellendaal’s skills, but equally to the advocacy of the performers. While I can’t end this review as the writer of the notes did by describing these as “masterpieces”, they are nonetheless very fine.
David Barker
Published: November 17, 2022
