GEORG PHILIPP TELEMANN (1681-1767)
Ouverture (Suite) C-durTWV 55:C6
1. (Grave)-(Allegro)
2. Harlequinade
3. Espagniol
4. Bourrée en Trompette
5. Sommeille
6. Rondeau
7. Menuet I & II
8. Gigue
PAUL GOODWIN • LORRAINE WOOD • SOPHIA McKENNA, Oboe
ALBERTO GRAZZI, Fagott
Scoring: Oboe I-III, Fagott, Streicher (5/4/2/2/1), Cembalo
Ouverture (Suite) D-durTWV 55
19
1. (Ohne Tempobezeichnung)
2. Bourée
3. Loure
4. Rondeau
5. Ecossoise
6. Minuet
7. Gigue
ANDREW CLARK • GAVIN EDWARDS, Jagdhorn
Scoring: Oboe I & II, Fagott, Jagdhorn I & II, Streicher (5/4/2/2/1), Cembalo
Ouverture (Suite) B-durTWV 55:B10
1. Ouverture
2. Rondeau
3. Air un pui viste
4. Hornepipe
5. Menuet I & II
6. Bouree
7. Plainte
8. Combattans
9. Passepied I & II
PAUL GOODWIN • LORRAINE WOOD • SOPHIA McKENNA, Oboe (hautbois)
ALBERTO GRAZZI, Fagott (bassoon)
Scoring: Oboe I-III, Fagott, Streicher (5/4/2/2/1), Cembalo
THE ENGLISH CONCERT
Konzertmeister: Peter Hanson
on authentic instruments
Directed from the harpsichord by
TREVOR PINNOCK
TELEMANN: THREE ORCHESTRAL SUITES
The influence of Italy and France on German music during the first half of the 18th century was nothing new. Palestrina had been an uncontested model to composers early in the previous century while Praetorius, Schein and Schütz, among others, achieved in various ways a synthesis of Italian and German styles. Where France was concerned, the thrust was aimed at Versailles whose buildings, paintings, sculpture and music became an aspiration for the numerous lay and ecclesiastical states which characterized Germany after the Thirty Years War (1618-4
. Though often divided both politically and in their faith - the north Protestant and the south Catholic - the rulers of these states shared a desire to outshine one another in their visual surroundings and cultural milieu, thereby displaying their wealth and importance. As well as commissioning Italian architects, painters and sculptors they engaged French designers and landscape gardeners and offered patronage to both French and Italian musicians. The contribution of these visitors to German and central European art can hardly be overstated, since not only was their artistic skill often of the first rank but their ability to integrate their work with the spirit of their surrounding life-style was such that it became an original interpretation of forms conceived largely in Italy and France.
One of the most successful musical forms to be imported and developed by German Baroque composers was that of the "Ouverture" whose origins lie in French ballet de cour and opera. In mid-17th century France the word "ouverture" was used to describe any instrumental piece which prefaced an opera, a ballet or even, sometimes, an act from them. But it was chiefly through the discipline of Louis XIV's surintendant de la musique, Lully, in the 1660s that a distinctive pattern emerged. This consists of an opening, slow section in dotted rhythm followed by a faster, often contrapuntal one which gives way to a third section which takes up the rhythm and some, if not all, the material of the opening. This pattern was to become, broadly speaking, an unbroken rule for almost a century.
Towards the end of Lully's life and during the first half of the 18th century the term "ouverture" widened its scope to embrace not only the overture itself but also the sequence of orchestral dance movements which increasingly became associated with it. The fashion for these overture-suites began in France in Lully's time but they were energetically cultivated and disseminated above all through the work of his pupils and disciples. Their "Ouvertüren", many of which were printed, provided valuable models for composers of the next generation - Bach, Handel, Telemann, Graupner, Stölzel and others who brought the form to a stylistic peak. The composition of orchestral suites occupied Telemann, doubtless with varying degrees of intensity, throughout his working life, covering a period of 60 years, approximately from 1705 to 1765. As the composer himself remarked in his autobiographies (1718 and 1739), the period between 1705 and 1707 was especially fertile in the production of orchestral suites. These were the years in which Telemann was engaged as Kapellmeister to Count Erdmann II of Promnitz at Sorau, Lower Lusatia (now Zary, in Poland). Probably during a "grand tour" the Count had acquired a liking for French music and not only furnished Telemann with examples of overtures by Lully, Campra and perhaps others, but expected his newly appointed Kapellmeister to compose similar pieces in the same idiom. Although it is impossible to date the exceptionally large quantity of orchestral suites which Telemann wrote - some 134 are preserved which probably represent only a modest portion of his output - the greater number of them almost certainly belong to the years prior to his appointment as Music Director at Hamburg (1721).
As well as affording Telemann an early opportunity of becoming fluent in the composition of orchestral suites, the Sorau assignment had a deep and enduring influence on his style. It was here, in the composer's own words, that he encountered the folk music of the region "in its true barbaric beauty ... one would scarcely believe what wonderful ideas the pipers or fiddlers have when they improvise. ... An observer could glean from them enough ideas in eight days to last a lifetime." Polish folk music left an indelible mark on Telemann's style which can be found to a greater or lesser extent in much of his orchestral and chamber instrumental compositions throughout his life. The three Suites in this recording admirably point up the invention with which Telemann endowed the form and the fluency with which he mastered French and Italian styles, often flavouring them with ideas derived from Polish folk music. The opening movements to each of these Suites are overtures in the French style, but one of the features that distinguishes them from their French antecedents is the freedom afforded to the wind parts. Few composers other than Bach wrote so rewardingly for three oboes, as opposed to the more conventional oboes in pairs. Telemann's Suites in B flat (TWV 55 BIO) and C major (TWV 55 C6) both contain independent parts for three oboes and bassoon to create a quartet texture which provides a strong and effective contrast with the body of strings. In the Suite in D major (TWV 55 D19) on the other hand, Telemann restricts himself to a pair of oboes which double the two violin parts throughout the work. But he introduces a pair of horns (cors de chassé) which ennoble the overture itself and give the Suite as a whole a festive character extending beyond the boundaries of traditional court ceremony.
As in the overtures themselves so, too, in the rich variety of appended movements Telemann makes frequent excursions beyond the conventional dances of the French court and theatre. Affecting instances abound of his depictive ability, his feeling for evocation and his fluently informed wind writing, above all that for oboes. In the Suite in B flat the Rondeau contains outstandingly effective episodes for a quartet of three oboes and a bassoon, while the Air with its drowsy cantabile and sustained note values evokes a wistful, elegiac atmosphere in which the composer often excelled. The Hornepipe hints on occasion at the Polish folk music idiom, while the Menuet is a veritable model of elegance and graceful gesture. The Plainte with its plangent modulations, characteristic of the composer, provides a striking example of Telemann's affective gift in oboe part-writing while the Com-battans introduces us to vigorous, Italianate upper string unisons recalling the tuttis of a Vivaldian concerto. In the concluding Passepieds Telemann creates an effective contrast by scoring the second of them for oboe and violin(s) without continuo.
From among the movements of the Suite in C major we may mention the Harlequinade with its lively, kinetic, sometimes syncopated gestures, and the atmospheric Sommeille with its tied notes and somnolent quavers. In the Suite in D major it is the Ecossoise which most vividly captures our imagination, enlivened by its "saccadé" rhythm, or "Scotch snap", underlining its intended Scottish character. These are all aspects of Telemann's writing which, though admired by his contemporaries writing in the same form, remained unsurpassed. They are qualities, furthermore, in which the composer himself seems to have recognized a particular talent, since they and many kindred ideas recur with astonishing frequency and freshness of invention almost throughout his surviving orchestral suites.
Uploaded earlier: The companion CD with 2 Suites and a Concerto
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