These two hybrid SACD
discs are the ‘audiophile’ versions
of recordings which have appeared in
a 4
CD set including Vivaldi’s Op.3
‘L’Estro Armonico’. Johan van Veen found
the performances ‘a delight to listen
to’ and ‘different’, and they certainly
differ from another recent version by
Sarah Chang which I recently reviewed.
There is of course the ‘early music
performance practise’ aspect which makes
direct comparison somewhat inapplicable,
but for me these performances take the
descriptive elements far beyond those
in Chang’s recording. They even make
that old favourite Archiv 400 045-2,
the English Concert with Simon Standage
and Trevor Pinnock, seem rather square.
In many ways they show how it should
be done, and in every regard can be
seen as something rather special.
The opening is a little
disconcerting, the solo violin beginning
with a trill on the interval of a minor
second, rather than on or around a major
second, which everyone else seems to
have accepted as standard. The interaction
of the solos and the variety of tone
and colour in the accompaniment soon
prove entirely absorbing however, and,
there is so much subtle teasing and
pictorial content – storms, and singing
birds, that you wonder why you accepted
anything else as even coming close.
The barking dog in the second movement
of Spring is gruff and persistent,
and a far more audible presence than
the solo line, which might have done
with having a little more red blood.
Stenano Montanari weaves softly above
the simple string accompaniment, and
builds a nice arch-form with some elegantly
extemporised ornamentation. The dancing
final movement is rich in emphasising
the strong bas lines, and the organ
and archlute reinforce and point up
the drones and harmonies. In a most
gentle way it ‘swingt de pan uit’ –
is genuinely groovy, and if you’re sold
by now, the rest can only get better.
The storms are a big
favourite with the Accademia Bizantina,
and Ottavio Dantone draws explosive
rumbles of thunder from his band. The
encroaching, first distant indications
of storms approaching in the second
movement of ‘Summer’ are particularly
convincing, and you can sense the sweat
dropping, the close air spinning with
insects and livid motes. The hail is
smashed out of the strings of the lute
in the final movement, and the sense
of chaos and ruin is palpable.
The drama continues
in ‘Autumn’, with sliding strings, dragging
tempi and one or two comic pauses accurately
describing the effects of alcohol on
your local, otherwise hard-working peasants
in the first movement. The harpsichord
gets a chance to shine in the second,
sleepily sustained Adagio, and
we are rudely awakened once more by
the horns and guns of the hunters in
the final Allegro, which really
punches out those first beat in the
bar chords, and the octaves from around
1:32 really fly like bullets – the strings
brutally snagged on the bow.
‘Winter’ is full of
exciting effects, and with the opening
Allegro non molto the influences
on a piece like Michael Nyman’s Memorial
are starkly apparent. The bows bouncing
on strings from 2:30 in a rustling quasi
col legno effect is particularly
marvellous. Fans of ‘the bubble’ kind
of beat will love the second movement,
with its driving basses moving everything
along with tight octaves, punctuated
with unrestrained pizzicato in the upper
strings. Stefano Montanari plays the
game of antici …. pation in the last
movement, taking a whole minute before
diving into the movement proper. He
is a very excellent soloist, and while
the sound of the gut strings is thinner
than a modern violin it inevitably mixes
well with the backing of similarly period
instruments.
Entirely sold on The
Four Seasons, it is a delight to
re-discover that the other concertos
in Vivaldi’s Op.8 are no makeweights,
and it is a genuine pleasure to have
them in their entirety. As much attention
to detail is spent on these remaining
works, and we get the full works on
the ‘Tempesta di Mare’, which has all
of the wildness of an operatic intermezzo
in which most of the cast are lost at
sea. Il Piacere or ‘The Delights’
are portrayals of emotion, the light
joy of the two outer movements contrasted
by a lamenting descending bass in the
central Largo e cantabile – proving
you can’t have the light without the
shade.
The second disc in
this set covers all of the non-named
concertos of Vivaldi’s Op.8, and La
Caccia or ‘The Chase’ RV 362. Even
though all of these concertos were published
in 1725 they are in fact a selection
from around 10 years worth of the composers
output. The minor tonalities of the
first concerto RV 242 are filled with
potent drama, as are some of the violent
contrasts in the opening Allegro
of RV 332, and while most of these
works lack the semantic references which
made ‘The Four Seasons’ such a popular
success the musical content is often
every bit as substantial. La Caccia
is a close cousin of ‘Autumn’ from
‘The Four Seasons’ and it seems strange
that, like Pete Best, it remains relatively
neglected as ‘The Fifth Season’, especially
when so many CDs of these works cry
out for suitable fillers. Remarkable
and better known concertos like RV 210
provide useful reference points in terms
of the standard of the whole, ensuring
that your wow factor for these recordings
is maintained. The oboe versions of
RV 454 and 449 provide some welcome
variety and are superbly played by Paolo
Grazzi as soloist – and despite some
criticism elsewhere I for one am grateful
not to have to sit through the same
works played on violin on the same disc.
Yes, there is a good deal of space left
on each disc, and ARTS might have done
themselves a favour by shoving both
discs into one case on some kind of
special offer, but in terms of sheer
quality I would be the last to complain.
These recordings have
genuine audiophile credentials; it says
so at the beginning of the booklet:
THIS IS AN AUDIOPHILE
RECORDING, so you know it
must be true. The booklet lists
an expensive array of microphones, and
tells us that this is the "First
ever recording and editing 24-bit/96Khz
on 10 tracks" and that "The
signal was not compressed or equalized
at any stage during production"
– something for which we can all be
profoundly grateful. I’m no sound technician,
but, given the chance to run my nice
new SACD kit to full capacity I can
appreciate the extra dimensions this
kind of presentation gives. Compared
to the standard CD setting the space
around the musicians, the sheer spread
of sound is greatly enhanced in SA,
and the greater involvement of the acoustic
adds to the effect of colour and dynamic
– the sense of air being moved by living
sound. These recordings have received
a number of awards and nominations,
which are listed in the back of the
booklet of volume 1, and the recordings
of L’Estro Armonico Op.3 are
also now available in this format. All
I can say is that these plaudits are
all richly deserved, and if you are
looking for something more than merely
decent to play on your expensive SACD
system then this is a very good place
to find high octane ear food, and music
and performances that you will want
to listen to more than once – in spades.
Dominy Clements
for details
ARTS
47564-8 [57:07] 
