Fabio Biondi - Telemann: 12 Fantasias for Solo Violin, TWV 40 (2016) [HDTracks]

On his first solo album, violinist Fabio Biondi presents Telemann’s 12 Fantasias for Solo Violin, works that reflect both the composer’s full maturity and his proficiency as a violinist himself. The dozen fantasias on the programme were written for an unaccompanied instrument and manage to embrace both the long established style for polyphony in German violin music, with fugues and multipart writing for the soloist, as well as more modern trends. For this recording Biondi played an 18th century Ferdinando Gagliano violin.

Georg Philipp Telemann’s 12 Fantasias for solo violin were written in 1735, when he was perhaps at the height of his fame. He also wrote sets of 12 solo works for other instruments, and these violin pieces were above all commercial enterprises. They are not fantasias in the usual sense, but multi-movement works in the Italian sonata manner, although the fast-slow-fast pattern is just one of several employed. They split the differences among Italianate sonata styles, the rising galant sound, and German fugal polyphony, each of which is artfully boiled down to violin lines that are considerably closer to the reach of amateur violinists than were the Bach sonatas and partitas for solo violin, composed 15 years earlier. This kind of smoothing down of styles into something easy to grasp and broadly accessible is pure Telemann, and you could jump in and sample anywhere to get the flavor of the whole. The music is not really in the tradition of virtuoso solo violin that Bach drew on, and there’s a bit of tension in hearing it played by a violinist, such as Fabio Biondi, who’s known for satisfyingly flashy performances of Italian repertory. Recordings of these works are not too common, and those played on a period instrument are rarer still, so it’s worth your while to hear Biondi’s Neapolitan Gagliano instrument of 1767 in this music. Biondi perhaps overpowers the music a bit, and the chilly church sound makes the music feel remote when it should have been pleasant and domestic. Your mileage may vary, however, and Biondi fans will welcome the chance to hear him play unaccompanied.