G. Ph. TELEMANN ERIK BOSGRAAF & FRIENDS - ENSEMBLE CORDEVENTO

G. Ph. TELEMANN ERIK BOSGRAAF & FRIENDS - ENSEMBLE CORDEVENTO THE DOUBLE CONCERTOS WITH RECORDER DIE DOPPELKONZERTE MIT BLOCKFLÖTE Georg Philipp Telemann 1681–1767 Telemann’s Double Concertos The Double Concertos with Recorder with Recorder In his autobiography of 1740, Georg Philipp “the Italian style ... currently occupies me Concerto in E minor for alto recorder, traverso, Concerto in B-fl at major for two alto recorders, Telemann (1681–1767) mentions that he more than the [other styles] do.” strings and basso continuo, TWV 52:e1 strings and basso continuo, TWV 52:B1 taught himself to play the recorder as well The Telemann scholar Steven Zohn has 1 Largo 3:53 17 Grave 2:07 as the violin and zither in elementary school noted: “The fact that the 1740 autobiography 2 Allegro 4:15 18 Vivace 1:32 before the age of 10, and continued to is silent on his Eisenach encounter with con- 3 Largo 3:39 19 Tendrement 1:49 practice the recorder into his teens. This love certos seems to indicate a change of heart. 4 Presto 2:39 20 Gayment 2:05 and practical understanding of the instrument Telemann’s apparent distaste for virtuosity help to explain why he wrote so much as an end in itself ... led him to develop his Concerto in A minor for two alto recorders, idiomatic music for it. own stylistic paradigm for the concerto, strings and basso continuo, TWV 52:a2 Total time: 63:14 In his lifetime, Telemann was considered one that tended to downplay soloistic display 5 Gravement 2:13 the consummate master of the new, progres- in favor of close dialogue and mixed-taste 6 Vistement 1:34 sive “mixed” German style, which drew on cosmopolitanism.” Telemann imbues ritornel- 7 Largement 1:56 Erik Bosgraaf, recorder & direction French and Italian elements. Telemann also los and especially solo episodes with great 8 Vivement 2:01 drew on Polish folk music, the “true barbaric rhythmic drive, primarily derived from Polish Anna Besson, traverso beauty” of which he had experienced fi rsthand folk music, and continually surprises with Concerto in F major for alto recorder, bassoon, Yi-Chang Liang, recorder (tracks 5–8, 17–20) with enormous enthusiasm when he worked in rapid switches between short-range or long- strings and basso continuo, TWV 52:F1 Robert Smith, viola da gamba Sorau (now Żary) in 1705–06, early in his career. range imitation, a variety of rhythmic cells, 9 Largo 4:27 Marije van der Ende, bassoon Telemann’s fi rst autobiography (1718) re- just enough passages of thirds and sixths, 10 Vivace 5:22 ports that after he moved to Eisenach in 1708, and exchanges with the orchestra. The only 11 [slow] 4:16 Ensemble Cordevento “I also tried my hand at concertos. About this conservative feature is the form, slow–fast– 12 Allegro 3:23 Violin I: Zefi ra Valova (concert master), I must confess that they have never really slow–fast. Evgeny Sviridov, Anna Dmitrieva come from my heart, although I have already With one exception, the manuscripts of Concerto in A minor for alto recorder, viola da Violin II: Ivan Iliev, Tomoe Badiarova written a considerable quantity of them.... the concertos survive in the library of the Viola: Zdenka Prochazkova, Femke Huizinga gamba, strings and basso continuo, TWV 52:a1 they mostly smell of France”—an allusion to Hesse Court in Darmstadt, so they were Cello: Linda Mantcheva, Heidi Peltoniemi 13 Grave 3:50 Double bass: Tomoki Sumiya his love of the French style. By the time he probably written for Michael Böhm, the com- 14 Allegro 4:05 Bassoon: Marije van der Ende provided a bio for Walther’s Musikalisches poser’s brother-in-law, a woodwind virtuoso 15 Dolce 3:30 Chitarrone & baroque guitar: Yavor Genov Lexicon (1732), he could already note that at the Court who left in 1729. 16 Allegro 4:02 Harpsichord: Alessandro Pianu 3 Concerto in E minor for alto recorder, Finally comes one of the composer’s most in its manuscript, has French titles for its Concerto in F major for alto recorder, traverso, strings and basso continuo, celebrated movements, an exciting polonaise movements. Appropriately, the fi rst two bassoon, strings and basso continuo, TWV 52:e1 en rondeau. The rondeau section is a wild movements constitute a French overture: TWV 52:F1 The attractive combination of recorder and Polish dance, with recorder, fl ute, and violin slow in dotted rhythm, then fast with imitative With the notable exception of Vivaldi, traverso also spawned several examples in 1 in unison over a bass drone. The solo epi- entries in the tutti sections. The solo sections who wrote a staggering 37 concertos for it, late Baroque chamber music, notably sodes also breathe the air of Poland: octave in the latter are mostly in thirds and sixths, the bassoon was a rare concertante instru- Telemann’s Quartet in D minor for recorder, leaps, broken chords in imitation, a drone in enlivened by some imitation, then some ment in the late Baroque. But the Darmstadt two fl utes, and continuo from Musique de octaves, slurred passage work, and a unison Polish rhythms. In the binary slow movement, Hofkapellmeister, Christoph Graupner, wrote Table II (1733). passage replete with “whooping” slides. recorders and strings alternate sighing phras- four bassoon concertos, implying that the The opening Largo begins with two es. The fi nal Vivement is a binary passepied court bassoonist, Johann Ludwig Brauer, cadenza-like runs for the fl ute, then recorder, with broken-chord fi gures reminiscent of the was a virtuoso. We can imagine Brauer reminiscent of the slow movement of Johann Concerto in A minor for two alto recorders, opening movement of Bach’s Brandenburg and Böhm as soloists in Telemann’s double Sebastian Bach’s Brandenburg Concerto strings and basso continuo, TWV 52:a2 Concerto No. 4. concerto—the scoring of which is not quite No. 4. After the soloists coo in thirds, in the Concerto in B-fl at major for two alto The B♭-major concerto, which mixes unique, because Matthäus Nikolaus Stulick middle section they alternate such thirds recorders, strings and basso continuo, French and Italian movement titles, is written wrote a similar concerto. with imitations of angular or leaping phrases. TWV 52:B1 in a mixed French and Italian style with some In Telemann’s concerto, the initial ritor- The opening section then returns, forming As Zohn points out, Telemann’s witty observa- Polish elements. The Grave in 3/2 time is nello of the Largo introduces the two main a frame. tion that his early concertos “mostly smell of spun out of the opening phrase and displays elements of the movement: counterpoint The Allegro’s ritornello is notable for France” could have been referring to a group a sarabande’s rhythmic features. The follow- (between violins 1 and 2) and sighing fi gures its fugue-like imitation on a head motive of double concertos written around 1718, ing Vivace, a jolly movement in 6/4 meter, in thirds. A new theme characterizes the solo borrowed from the second movement of including the two for a pair of recorders. The shows Telemann’s loose early approach to sections, contrasted with the sighing fi gures, the composer’s oboe sonata TWV 41:e6 A minor concerto is preserved in parts in ritornello form. Tendrement, the binary third gradually transformed into impassioned (Essercizii musici, mid-1720s). In the solo Dresden. It was presumably performed there movement, is built from its opening dotted strings of short notes. A binary Vivace fol- sections, recorder and fl ute, whether in by the celebrated Court orchestra, which had motive, mostly tutti with glimpses of the solo- lows, in which passage work for the strings imitation or thirds, produce enormous a group of Hautboisten that included Flutti ists. The fi nal binary Gayment sounds like a frames brilliantly varied material for recorder rhythmic drive, braked occasionally by or Flautenisten, apparently recorder players, stamping dance. The running bass line in the and bassoon, changing in a breathtakingly sighing fi gures. The Largo, framed by a separate from the fl ute players. Parts for the fi rst section inspires some stepwise passage unpredictable manner from phrase to phrase: few measures for strings, is so aria-like B♭-major concerto survive both in Dresden work by the soloists in the second section. imitations of short motives or long phrases, that George Frideric Handel borrowed the and in Darmstadt (copied by Johann Samuel thirds in triplets, a cadenza-like run over a head motive for his air “Where’er You Walk” Endler, who worked at the Court from 1723). pedal point, a couple of suspensions, and in his oratorio Semele (1743). The A-minor concerto, called Grand Concert a fi nal triumphant burst of thirds. 4 5 The slow movement in 3/2 time has a In the following Allegro, again in ritornello Telemanns Doppelkonzerte worüber man aber schreiben möchte....sie frame of two orchestral sections containing form, all the ritornellos except the second mit Blockfl öte mehrentheils nach Frankreich riechen”— delightful dissonances, and a solo section return strictly. This time, however, Telemann eine Anspielung auf seine Vorliebe für den over a string pulse over which recorder and is closer to Vivaldi in introducing a wealth of In seiner 1740 erschienenen Autobiographie ’Französischen Stil’. Als er für Walthers Mu- bassoon exchange angular phrases and new material in the solo sections, although lässt uns Georg Philipp Telemann (1681– sikalisches Lexicon (1732) einen Lebenslauf sighing thirds. In the fi nal Allegro, the solo the rhythmic drive and syncopations of the 1767) wissen, dass er sich, noch bevor er verfasste, hatte sich dies bereits gewandelt: sections all begin with the head motive, material have a Polish fl avor.

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