Alain Marion, Daniele Roi - C.P.E. Bach: Flute Sonatas (2016) [DSD64]

The practise of recording musical works in the settings in which they were created is related to a recent evolution in the conception of art in western Europe: that of "archeology".
As far as I am concerned, I am referring to the idea of "musical archeology".
After Modernism, often difficult to understand for a public which is lit­tle prepared for a separatist art, (be it painting, literature, or music), the Eighties have witnessed the revival of a desire to find links with past artistic -traditions: not in an attempt to return to a Neoclassical cultural expression, but rather to effect a synthesis between this past and it's revival, by way of a distinctly modern sensibility, knowledge, and consideration.
The same idea applies to the evolution of the concepts which preside over the performance of a musical work.
In the sixties, musicology (first in England, and subsequently in Italy and France) modified our approach to music, re-discovering modes of inter­pretation used in the first pe1formances of these works; "original" instru - ments; reduced numbers of musicians, different voices, and so on.
Today, on the basis of this new-found discipline, and, therefore on its truth, an "archeological" reflection and skill is developing in all the art s, aiming at finding the same spirit with which past works were performed.
Settings such as the villas in and around Lucca in no way resemble those neutral spaces which, in general, make up the concert halls of the modern world; these villas were inhabited, in the fullest sense of the word, and each one guards its own familial, cultural, and historical characteristics.
The recording project in these "enchanted places" has attempted to revive that "genie du lieu" which has interacted, culturally, with the works being performed. As far as FONE is concerned, we are talking about redi­scovering that authenticity, not in order to search for some lost musical Paradise, but rather to re-awaken an awareness of the past, without which the present has no meaning.
The respect for high fidelity, in its wholest sense, is fundamental to the recording criteria for FONE. It is a question of capturing the "life of the concert", with the focus on the event which (he concerts itself represents.
It was this high fidelity that led FONE to discover the acoustics of whose very settings for which the music was conceived. Again, it was this high fidelity that dictated the recording techniques; two principal microphones, one or two ambiental microphones, and a tape recorder. There was no manipulation of level control, no adjustment to the natural acoustic surroundings, which would make the sound easier to realize, but which would result in a certain loss of realism, • in short, there was a desire to respect the music without technical intervention.
At a time in which new technology (beginning with a numerical codification of the recorded sound signal) is leading us to hope for a considerable improvement in sound reproduction, it seems essential to FONE to give a new image of a product in which the search for quality is without compromise.