Sor: The Fortepiano Works

Fernando Sor (1778-1839)

Mazurka (1835)
Six Waltzes (1815-1819) [First Set]
Les Favorites des Salons (1821)
[A Second Set of original Quadrilles]
Les Cuirassiers (1821) [A First Set of original Quadrilles]
Six Waltzes (1817-1820) [Second Set]
Les Choisies (1822) [A Third Set of original Quadrilles]

Josep Maria Roger - Fortepiano

Sor is better known for his guitar works. Here are his works for solo piano.

[Flac & Scans]

Clementi: Complete Piano Duets

Muzio Clementi (1752-1832)

3 Duets Op. 3 (1779)
Duet Op. 6 (1781)
3 Duets Op. 14 (1786)

Duo Hammerklavier
Galina Draganova & Vasily Ilisavsky



(Flac & Scans)

Cimarosa: Le Sonate Per Fortepiano, Vols. 1 - 3

Domenico Cimarosa (1749-1801)
Complete Piano Sonatas C. 1 - C. 88
Andrea Coen - Fortepiano

These 88 single movement sontatas are reminiscent of those by Scarlatti or Soler. It is theorized that many of these pieces are meant to be played together as two or three movement sonatas. The last 10 would feel at home in Mozart's Vienna.

Three Discs

(Flac & Scans)

Jadin- Complete Sonatas for Fortepiano

Hyacinthe Jadin (1776-1800)
12 Piano Sonatas Op. 3, Op. 4, Op. 5 & Op. 6
Richard Fuller- Fortepiano

A contemporary of Beethoven, Jadin wrote these 12 piano sonatas in Paris at about the same time as Beethoven was writting his sonatas in Vienna.

3 Discs in this set.



(Flac and Covers)

Zemlinsky: Lyrische Symphonie - Dorow, Nimsgern, Ferro (1978)

Alexander von Zemlinsky

Lyrische Symphonie Op. 18

Dorothy Dorow

Siegmund Nimsgern

BBC Symphony Orchestra

Gabriele Ferro

Italia Fonit Cetra - CDC 70

"...durstig nach fernem Dingen"

Although not as central a figure as Schoenberg was in Vienna and in the history of music of the 20th Century, and certainly less important than his fellow Viennese master, Alexander Zemlinsky is nonetheless a very interesting composer. Better known for his short opera "Eine florentinische Tragödie" and his extensive chamber production, including 4 beautiful string quartets, his masterpiece still remains the powerful and exotic Lyric Symphony, composed at the beginning of the 20s, at the peak of his artistic maturity.

In many ways, this magnificent composition stems from the same cultural scenario which lead Mahler to explore the Chinese poetry for "Das Lied von der Erde" some 15 years earlier. Zemlinsky's "Thirst for far away Things" was fulfilled when he discovered Rabindranath Tagore's poem "The Gardener". The marvellous text inpired Zemlinsky to write a luxuriant and masterly jugendstil score, with amazingly rich and refined orchestration and many deeply moving sections, such as the wonderful call for peace in the last Lied, "Friede, mein Herz".

In this 1992 CD of an original April 1978 recording in London, one of Italy's lesser known, yet more interesting conductors of his generation, Gabriele Ferro conducts the splendid BBC Symphony and is joined by two intelligent artists, who were famous in the 70s and in the 80s among modern music acolytes, the English soprano Dorothy Dorow, and the German baritone Siegmund Nimsgern.

EAC APE, Lyrics & Covers

A little about Francesco Antonio Bonporti

To accompany Sankerib's Bonporti Week celebrations, you might like to read a little about this composer's life and career:

(b Trent, bap. 11 June 1672; d Padua, 19 Dec 1749). Italian composer. Of good family, he was educated in his native city and Innsbruck in philosophical and humanistic subjects appropriate to the clerical vocation he was to follow. While studying theology at the Collegio Germanico in Rome in 1691–5 Bonporti took music lessons (presumably not his first). Corelli is said to have instructed him in violin playing, and Pitoni in the composition of sacred vocal music, but there is only slender evidence of this. Bonporti returned to Trent ordained as a priest and obtained a minor office in the cathedral in 1697. His op.1, a set of ten trio sonatas (he consistently grouped his instrumental works in tens rather than twelves), had been published the year before. On the title-page the composer called himself ‘gentiluomo di Trento’, noting his non-professional status as a musician. 11 further sets followed, all except one (op.3) consisting of secular music with a bias towards da camera specifications; of these the majority appeared during the first decade of the 18th century, when there was an unprecedented boom in the publishing of Italian instrumental music both inside and outside Italy.

Bonporti regarded himself as primarily a priest rather than a composer, although, ironically, his clerical advancement was no more rapid than the spread of his musical renown. This explains the otherwise puzzlingly ‘secular’ nature of his musical output; for despite the care which he obviously lavished on even the least substantial of his compositions, music was for Bonporti a means towards a non-musical end: his appointment to a canonry at Trent or an equivalent clerical post elsewhere. Each new opus saw an increasingly desperate attempt to win the favour of a dignitary who might secure his advancement. Beginning modestly with dedications to local, mostly ecclesiastical potentates, he worked his way up the feudal and ecclesiastical hierarchy until in a letter of 1716 we hear of no less a person than George I of England being solicited. (In letters to the secretary of the Elector of Mainz written in 1715 Bonporti offered to forgo a year's salary if appointed chaplain to the emperor at Vienna.) Such gains as Bonporti made through these representations were merely titular. In 1721 he signed himself in a letter to Prince Schwarzenberg ‘maestro dei concerti di S. M[aes]tà Ces[are]a e Catt[oli]ca’, and in 1727 he was made an ‘aulic familiar’ by Charles VI. The canonry remained remote. It is known that rivalry between German and Italian speakers in the church hierarchy at Trent (where the former, associated by language and culture with the seat of the empire, enjoyed an advantage) prevented his appointment whenever vacancies arose. Embittered by this failure, Bonporti moved to Padua in 1740, lodging in the house of a fellow priest. A final appeal to Empress Maria Theresa in 1746, in which op.12 was enlisted, proved fruitless. He died three years later and was buried in Padua.

Bonporti's merits as a composer were first realized in modern times when it was announced in 1911 by Werner Wolffheim that four of his inventions for violin and continuo, op.10 nos.2, 5, 6 and 7, had been included by Alfred Dörffel in volume xlv of Bach's works following an incorrect attribution to Bach in a manuscript source. Not only may Bach have imitated Bonporti in his use of the unusual term ‘Invention’ as a title, but the third movement (‘Ecco’) of the tenth invention in Bonporti's op.10 may have provided Bach with a model for the corresponding movement, similar in conception, of his Ouverture in B minor for harpsichord (bwv831). The celebrated violinist F.M. Veracini is known to have included op.10 in his repertory on German tours in 1715. By then the work, which had originally appeared in 1712, was known as La pace, the composer having seized the opportunity afforded by the Peace of Utrecht in 1713 to add this ingratiating sobriquet to later editions. (The ‘Triumph of the Grand Alliance’, opp.8 and 9, dating from c1710, betrays similar motives.)

In common with other north Italian instrumental composers of his generation, Bonporti based his musical language on Corelli. But whereas the main concern of many of his contemporaries, such as Dall'Abaco, was the expansion and clarification of form, Bonporti seems to have concentrated on the enhancement of melodic detail. (A limited parallel with Bach can be drawn here.) In the Recitativo movement of the first work in op.10 Bonporti offers what is in effect a copiously graced Adagio, entirely instrumental in idiom. But the similarly titled movement in the fifth concerto of op.11 (a very impressive publication in the domain of the concerto) introduces inflections of unmistakably vocal origin, highly original and effective in their unexpected context. Beneath the ‘extravagance’ (as contemporary writers would have termed it) of Bonporti's technically highly evolved writing for the violin a solid musical intention can be discerned; this is expressed through cogent, if not always highly systematized, forms, imaginative harmony and lively part-writing.

The present-day neglect of Bonporti's music owes something to the scarcity of surviving source material, something to the undervaluing of works in the chamber idiom and something to his non-adherence to any regional school of acknowledged historical importance, such as the Venetian. It does scant justice to his stature as a composer.

M Talbot/E Careri from Grove Music (acc. 20022012)

Bonporti: Bonporti Edition Vol.1 - Accademia I Filarmonici, Martini

Francesco Antonio Bonporti
Bonporti Edition Vol.1 - Motetti Op.3 (1702)
Accademia I Filarmonici, Alberto Martini, Gemma Bertagnolli
Dynamic CDS 280

Bonporti: Bonporti Edition Vol.2 - Accademia I Filarmonici, Martini

Francesco Antonio Bonporti
Bonporti Edition Vol.2 - Sonate da Camera (1703)
Accademia I Filarmonici, Alberto Martini
Dynamic CDS 352

Bonporti: Bonporti Edition Vol.3 - Accademia I Filarmonici, Martini

Francesco Antonio Bonporti
Bonporti Edition Vol.3 - Concerti a Quattro
Accademia I Filarmonici, Alberto Martini
Dynamic CDS 353-1-2

It took me well over a year to find a copy of this OOP recording for sale and the price tag was accordingly so I really hope you will all enjoy it. I know I do. - Sankerib

Complete works (Vol. 3): Concerti a Quattro Op. XI With this new recording Dynamic continues its project to publish all the works by Francesco Antonio Bonporti (1672-1749). Born in Trento, Bonporti remained practically unknown up to the early 1900s, when a scholar of Bach, Werner Wolfheim, realised that four compositions thought to have been by Johann Sebastian Bach were instead transcriptions, in Bach's handwriting, of four Invenzioni a violino solo e basso continuo by the Italian Bonporti. This third volume features the Concerti a Quattro per due violini, viola, violone e cembalo, undoubtedly the apex of Bonporti's output. From the point of view of instrumental writing, these works are half way between the concerto for solo, in the form codified by Vivaldi at the beginning of the 1700s, and the concerto grosso of Corellian tradition. All ten concertos, however, have a clearly individual imprint, which makes for very pleasant listening. - Amazon.com

Bonporti: Bonporti Edition Vol.4 - Accademia I Filarmonici, Martini

Francesco Antonio Bonporti
Bonporti Edition Vol.4 - Inventioni Op.10, Sonate Op.7
Accademia I Filarmonici, Alberto Martini
Dynamic CDS 424-1-2

Bonporti: Bonporti Edition Vol.5 - Accademia I Filarmonici, Martini

Francesco Antonio Bonporti
Bonporti Edition Vol.5 - Sonate Op.4, Sonate Op.6
Accademia I Filarmonici, Alberto Martini
Dynamic CDS 456-1-2

Beethoven: Piano Sonatas Nos. 3, 21 and 30 - Tipo (1986)

Ludwig van Beethoven

Piano Sonatas

No. 3 Op. 2 No. 3 in C Major

No. 21 Op. 53 "Waldstein" in C Major

No. 30 Op. 109 in E Major

Maria Tipo

EMI 2706641 - 1986

Our beloved Neapolitan virtuoso, who turned 80 a few weeks ago, has approached Beethoven's musical milestones far from regularly in her long and bright career. I certainly remember a Concerto No. 4 in 1994 in Florence, when her delivery of the mysterious cadenza in the Andante left me mesmerized, as if she had suddenly switched from Beethoven to the Mikrokosmos.

A few years earlier, she recorded this beautiful album in Paris. Combining the early virtuosic 3rd Sonata with a middle one (the stunning "Waldstein") and an absolute masterpiece, from the late period, the first of the last three sublime meditations on the human soul, the empyrean Op. 109.

Tipo aptly adjusts her style to each of the three sonatas, and nearly moves us to tears in the first bars of No. 30.

Digital Recording.

LP rip.

1 Sonata per file.

APEs & Covers

Boccherini: Sting Quintets Vol. 1-9 - La Magnifica Comunità

Luigi Boccherini
String Quintets Vol. 1-9
La Magnifica Comunità

Ripped, arranged, uploaded, and shared by (and all credits to), new MIMIC co-author Duckjammy.

Thanks for an immense effort Duckjammy!

Hellendaal: Six Grand Concertos Op.3 - CC Amsterdam, Vriend

Pieter Hellendaal
Six Grand Concertos for Violins etc. in Eight Parts Opus 3
Conbattiment Cosort Amsterdam, Jan Willem de Vriend
NM Classics 92019

Dutch composer, Dutch orchestra, Dutch conductor.
It just feels so right doesn't it? Enjoy!

Dutch composers are generally a closed book outside of the Netherlands, with a very few exceptions. Pieter Hellendaal (1721-1799) is not one of those exceptions, but on the basis of this CD, he may well deserve to be. All of these concertos make for very pleasant and diverting listening, best listened to one at a time, IMHO with baroque music in general. Hellendaal tweaked the traditional 4-movement 'sonata da chiesa' structure by adding a 5th movement in each of these concerti grossi. The Combattimento Consort Amsterdam use "historically informed practices" on modern instruments, and thus give the modern instruments a light and sprightly spirit in these performances, with Jan Willem de Vriend at the helm.

Recordings of Hellendaal's music are not common, so consider yourself fortunate if you come across this CD. You should spare a thought for the fact that the NM Classics label shut down operations some years back, but then be grateful that they got to record what they did, such as this issue.

G.C. - Amazon customer

Albrechtsberger - Concerti per Trombula e Mandora

Johann Georg Albrechtsberger (1736-1809)

Concerto in F, for Jew's Harp, Mandora & Strings (1770)
Concerto in Eb, for Jew's Harp, Harpsichord & Strings (1771)
Concerto in E, for Jew's Harp, Mandora & Strings (1771)
Concerto in D, for Jew's Harp, Mandora & Strings (1769)

Albin Paulus- Jews Harp
Pietro Prosser- Mandora
Enrico Baiano- Cembalo

Flac & Covers

Piccolo Concerto Wien- Roberto Sensi

Korngold: Symphony Op. 40 - DePreist

Erich Wolfgang Korngold

Symphony Op. 40 in F-Sharp Major

"The Sea Hawk" (Main Title - Reunion - Finale)

The Oregon Symphony

James DePreist

Delos 3234 - 1998

This great masterpiece of the symphonic repertoire is becoming increasingly popular in recent years. Much overdue, considering this large scale work was composed by the great Austrian Maestro in 1952 and it was only premiered 20 years on by Rudolf Kempe in Munich.

Dimitri Mitropoulos loved it, and so did many outstanding conductors in the last decades. What I find extraordinary about the Symphony is Korngold's peculiar style, which makes for a true late-romantic symphonic classic of the last century, alongside Prokofiev's 5th, Shostakovich's 5th, 7th and 10th, Honegger's 3rd, Stravinsky's Psalms symphony and so on...

The Brucknerian Adagio - dedicated to the memory of the late F.D. Roosevelt - is a marvel in itself, of mind-blowing depth at first hearing.

Of the many recordings available for this masterpiece, I present here my favourite, with the distinguished James DePreist leading his superb Portland ensemble in a most moving and virtuosic performance.

In addition, please enjoy the short Sea Hawk suite, probably Korngold's most succesful score as a film music composer.

FLACs & Cover

G.B. Sammartini - Early Symphonies for String Orchestra

Giovanni Battista Sammartini
The Complete Early Symphonies for String Orchestra
Riccardo Villiani, I Giovanni di Nuova Cameristica, Daniele Ferrari
Nuevo Era 231996

Get it now! It's very good.
(Review by Sankerib)

Torelli: Concerti Grossi Op.8 - Michelucci, Cotogni, I Musici

Giuseppe Torelli
Concerti Grossi, Op. 8, Nos. 2, 3, 6
Violin Concertos, Op. 8, Nos. 9, 12
Michelucci, Cotogni, Centurione, I Musici
Naxos 9.80218

A unique LP rip of an old 1956 recording. That means MP3 lossy quality ladies and gentlemen and that's a first in any of my posts. Chances are that it will never happen again but this rarity is worth the download anyway. Trust me eh! ;-)

J.S. Bach: Die Kunst der Fuge BWV 1080 - Isolde Ahlgrimm (on Pedal Harpsichord)

Johann Sebastian Bach
Die Kunst der Fuge BWV 1080
Isolde Ahlgrimm on Pedal Harpsichord
Friedericke Resele, harpsichord II


Tudor CD "Musique oblige" 7030


Among the many recordings of THE masterpiece of JSB this is a special one, recorded on the pedal harpsichord.
Ahlgrimm shows off a great understanding of the whole, using the power of the instrument with great accuracy and not overshadowing the other parts.
The pedal harpsichord helps in clarifying the polyphonic structure, and let the intricate counterpoint emerge in all its complexity.
Mrs Ahlgrimm was a fervent supporter of this great instrument (she recorded other Bach's works: Toccatas, Suites); historically justified or not? much debate about...and this disc is strongly in favour of the former.
Sound is a little raw, but the playing surely is not....

Enjoy!

P.S.  A link to get a little more info about the pedal harpsichord: here

Domenico Scarlatti: 17 sonatas - Zhu Xiao-Mei (piano)

Another gem from the French Institut National de l'Audiovisuel's INA/mèmoire vive series, recorded in concert at Martinů Hall, Prague Academy of Music (15 November 1995).

Elegance, vitality, grace, energy. A wondrous little thing. You'll see.
Don't miss the lagniappe, the Schubert Allegretto on the last track.

Not my own rip -- this now out-of-print recording is shared here with the generous collaboration of DanseDePuck.

flac+cue+covers

Zingarelli: Milanese Symphonies I - Atalanta Fugiens, Moretto

Niccolò Zingarelli
The Milanese Symphonies Vol.1
Atalanta Fugiens, Vanni Moretto
DHM 88697628772

In his exploration of the "Archivio della Sinfonia Milanesa", Vanni Moretto has now reached the works of Niccolò Zingarelli. This is the first volume, the second has not been released yet. It seems that no one has reviewed this recording yet so you have to take my word for it's high quality. Enjoy!

Chelleri: Six Simphonies Nouvelles - Atalanta Fugiens, Moretto

Fortunato Chelleri
Six Simphonies Nouvelles
Atalanta Fugiens, Vanni Moretto
DHM 88697294572

Vanni Moretto continues his exploration of the "Archivio della Sinfonia Milanesa". This time with focus on the works of Fortunato Chelleri. I was not able to locate any review for this recording either but if I were you I would download it instantly and if you do I hope you enjoy it as much as I have lately.

Antonio Brioschi: Sei Sinfonie - Atalanta Fugiens, Vanni Moretto

Antonio Brioschi
Sei Sinfonie
Atalanta Fugiens, Vanni Moretto
DHM 88697031162

Join Vanni Moretto in his exciting exploration of the "Archivio della Sinfonia Milanesa". First in the spotlight is Antonio Brioschi. There is no review available for this recording at this point. Enjoy!

Debussy: Jeux (Piano Version) - Ader

Claude Debussy
Jeux (Piano Version)
Préludes 1ère Livre
Alice Ader
OGAM 488005-2 - 2002


Paris, 29th May 1913, at the Théâtre des Champs-Élysées Pierre Monteux looks at his bassoonist and unfolds Modern Music to the world, creating the sensationalistic mayhem and rage we all know of at Stravinsky’s Sacre du Printemps première.

That day, sat a funny looking man in the beautiful, newly opened hall on Avenue Montaigne. His mind probably reflecting on when his own music, two weeks before, had already marked the beginning of the great modern musical art, albeit a less chaotic but just as unsuccessful soirée, with the great Nijinsky on stage.
This man, in my humble opinion one of the five greatest innovators of the entire history of music alongside Bach, Beethoven, Wagner and Schoenberg, was Claude Debussy. The sublime masterpiece premiered just a few days before the Sacre, in the very same theatre, under the same conductor, was Jeux.

This amazingly intellectual composition almost makes the Sacre sound like a comfortable mainstream work. While Stravinsky’s masterpiece confronts the listener with powerful interwoven dynamics and startling rhythmical figures, Debussy’s heady and sensual score takes modernity to a totally new structural depth.

In order to really fathom the harmonic marvels, it helps to plunge into the amazing solo piano version, although personally I’m in love with the sublime orchestral colours of the full score. In this superb recording, Alice Ader analyses this fundamental music like no one else, conveying the playful and innocently mischievous ménage à trois of the subject’s ballet with elegance and beauty of tone.

This distinguished Parisian pianist, a champion of the great contemporary repertoire at IRCAM, also treats her listener with a delicate and subtle rendition of another of Debussy’s milestones, the 1st Book of the Préludes.


FLACs & Covers

Binder: Concerto per due Cembali - Cyclopes, Lapointe, Maeder

Christlieb Sigmund Binder
Concerto per due Cembali
Les Cyclopes, Bibane Lapointe, Thierry Maeder
Pierre Verany PV704061

There are certainly not many recordings out there of the works of Christlieb Sigmund Binder so I hope you appreciate this 2007 take on his Concertos for Two Harpsichords and Orchestra. Enjoy them half as much as I do and it will be well worth the download!