This completes Naxos’s
recordings devoted to the Op.5 sonatas of Corelli. The earlier
performances were by Lucy van Dael and Bob van Asperen [Naxos.8.557165].
Pitch here is A’= 400 Hz which is to say about a whole tone below
modern pitch but there’s quite sufficient astringency to François
Fernandez’s Guarneri to ensure that the music emerges with vibrancy
and attack.
These
are in short highly accomplished and convincing traversals. Questions
of ornamentation are addressed in the notes by harpsichordist
Glen Wilson, as is the matter of the realization of the figured
bass part – which is here given over entirely to the harpsichord,
a Ruckers copy. Such matters, in themselves hardly academic, may
tempt readers one way or another, given that others performers
– let’s take Elizabeth Wallfisch and the Locatelli Trio (now on
a Hyperion Double Dyad CDD22047) as a front-running example -
make different choices and utilise different solutions.
I mentioned that Fernandez hardly lacks for
attack; in fact his tone is sometimes astringent, reminding one
perhaps of a baroque Kremer, or an off-day Szigeti in its tonal
qualities. His performances however are thoroughly convincing
on their own terms and he’s fortunate that Wilson plays so adroitly,
never self consciously (well, not often) and is a forthright collaborator.
In this respect too the recording engineers have taken care to
balance the two instruments with great precision in relation to
each other.
A few examples of the laudable qualities of
the playing should convince one of the sheer musicianship evinced
by both men. The repeated figures of the Sarabande of the Eighth
Sonata are varied with care, dynamics being finely scaled. The
Giga of the D minor [No.7] is deftly articulated; diminuendi are
crafted with assurance and above these matters there’s a convincing
sense of melodic sweep. There’s no sense of hurry or excessive
dynamism, though the performances are by no means slow – in fact
they’re well textured and relatively fast. The flying decoration
in the Preludio of the E minor is excellently realised; the Giga
of the A major – heard here in the edition with Geminiani’s ornaments
- is robust and full of stature.
If one has reservations maybe they concern
the occasionally nasal tonal qualities that Fernandez promotes;
maybe also Wilson is too combative a presence in, say, the second
movement Allegro of the E major [No.11]. Nevertheless I rather
admired the daring metrical stretching of some parts of La
Folia where we find Fernandez unafraid to bring a Manze-like
personalisation to the melodic line (Manze and Egarr’s set can
be found on HMU90 7298.99 and characteristically these two make
more expressively extreme statements than other duos). But if
one perhaps draws back from wholly endorsing some of Fernandez
and Wilson’s ideas I think one can fairly note that their taste
and good sense really don’t desert them.
Taken on its own terms, with appropriate questions
of instrument, pitch and ornamentation taken into account, this
is a first class addition to the Corelli discography.
Jonathan Woolf
See also Review
by Brian Wilson
François Fernandez
(violin) 
