Vivaldi
Concerti per vari strumenti II
Les Musiciens du Prince-Monaco / Gianluca Capuano
Naive OP9025 46 mins
It is a little over 20 years since the first volume of concertos for various instruments was released in the ongoing Vivaldi Edition.
Volume Two contains a comparable selection of pieces featuring two or more solo or at least independent parts for instruments other than the backbone of strings. One of the most generously scored of them is the Concerto in C major, RV555 with independent parts for 15 instruments of varying colour and disposition. Such works have a decidedly occasional flavour, presumably having been written for Vivaldi’s musically gifted pupils at the Ospedale della Pietà or for court entertainment.
While the earlier recording was entrusted to Orchestra Barocca Zefiro under participating oboist Alfredo Bernardini, its Monaco-based sequel features Les Musiciens du Prince, an ensemble founded a decade ago on the initiative of mezzo-soprano Cecilia Bartoli. The playing sparkles with contributions by an accomplished colloquium of woodwind and string soloists.
While Vivaldi seldom reaches the wonderful flights of poetic utterance ever present in his violin concertos, we can revel in the deft deployment of instrumental colour on display in these inventive and pioneering pieces.
Oboes feature prominently in the present anthology, which includes the most interesting of the three concertos for two oboes and strings, unusually for Vivaldi, in four movements. This concerto and the kaleidoscopic RV555, with solo parts for flutes, oboe, chalumeau, violins, viola da gamba, cellos and two harpsichords are, to my ears, the most rewarding items. All is directed with energy and artistic assurance by harpsichordist Gianluca Capuano.
