Cappella Academica Frankfurt - The Virtuoso Recorder, Vol. 3 (2015)

Following our two collections of virtuosic recorder concertos of the German and Italian Baroque (jpc 2655290 and jpc 1175295) – which, if we may say so ourselves, are to be termed nothing less than sensational – Michael Schneider now turns to Baroque England. For this epoch London can be termed the world capital of the recorder in more than one respect. London had outstanding virtuosos on this instrument such as James Paisible; moreover, recorder construction also reached a high point with two generations of the Stanesby family and with the French-born Peter Bressan. In London the recorder was played on every level both by dilettantes and professionals. In his CD selection Michael Schneider endeavors to be guided by two principles: his wish for the greatest possible tonal variety within this repertoire (therefore, by way of exception, also concertos for the transverse flute) as well as the quality of the individual pieces. His concertos are based on three anthologies by William Babell, Robert Woodcock, and John Baston, which have in common the use of »small flutes, « that is, recorders in the descant register, as well as what is repeatedly a clear affinity to the tonal idiom of George Frideric Handel, which in Babell and Woodcock can be traced to what are almost note-for-note citations. The works of Robert Woodcock stand out in particular. His concertos are most highly imaginative and in each case individually designed. (It is not without reason that one of his oboe concertos was long regarded as a work by Handel.)