Rating: 5/5
Review:
A fantastic box
This is a simply fantastic box of all six volumes of Café Zimmermann's
recordings of Bach's "Concerts avec plusiers instruments." These include
all six Brandenburg Concertos, the four Overtures or Orchestral Suites
and the concertos for violin, oboe and harpsichords in various
combinations. I have listed the works below. The music is all
magnificent and played with a freshness combined with depth of
understanding which is a real joy.
Café Zimmermann are a small
ensemble, generally playing with one instrument to a part and this,
combined with terrific musicianship and scholarship, gives their
interpretations a real zing in the livelier movements and genuine beauty
and emotion in the slower passages. To me, this is what Bach should
sound like: sometimes dancing, sometimes deeply spiritual, sometimes
simply lovely. I have a much-loved set of Bach concertos by Trevor
Pinnock (
Bach: Concertos) and while these won't replace them in my affections, they will certainly stand alongside them and be played at least as often.
The
other great strength of these discs is the programming. Many sets of
these concertos group, say, the harpsichord concertos or the violin
concertos together, and I find that I often don't want to listen to all
of them one after another. Here, each disc has one Brandenburg Concerto,
for example, and a varied combination of other concertos, so that
playing the whole disc is a varied pleasure and I am always happy to let
a whole disc play rather than changing it after one or two concertos.
In
short, this box - the fruits of ten years' work - is an unalloyed
delight and guaranteed to give immense pleasure for many years. Very
warmly recommended.
The works:
CD 1
1. Concerto pour clavecin en Ré Mineur, BWV 1052
2. Concerto pour hautbois d'amour en La Majeur, BWV 1055
3. Concerto pour violon en Mi Majeur, BWV 1042
4. Concert Brandebourgeois No. 5 en Ré Majeur, BWV 1050
CD 2
1. Concert Brandebourgeois No. 3 en Sol Majeur, BWV 1048
2. Concerto pour deux violons & cordes en Ré Mineur, BWV 1043
3. Suite en Ut Majeur, BWV 1066
4. Concerto pour hautbois & violon en Ut Mineur, BWV 1060
CD 3
1. Concert Brandebourgeois No. 4 en Sol Majeur, BWV 1049
2. Concerto pour hautbois d'amour en Ré Majeur, BWV 1053
3. Concerto pour trois clavecins en Do Majeur, BWV 1064
4. Suite en Si Mineur, BWV 1067
CD 4
1. Concerto pour violon en La Mineur, BWV 1041
2. Concerto pour 2 clavecins en Ut Majeur, BWV 1061
3. Concerto pour flûte, violon & clavecin en La Mineur, BWV 1044
4. Concert Brandebourgeois No. 2 en Fa Majeur, BWV 1047
CD 5
1. Ouverture No. 3 en Ré Majeur, BWV 1068
2. Concerto pour clavecin en Fa Mineur, BWV 1056
3. Concerto Brandebourgeois No. 6 en Si Bémol Majeur, BWV 1051
4. Concerto pour trois clavecins en Ré Mineur, BWV 1063
CD 6
1. Ouverture No. 4 en Ré Majeur, BWV 1069
2. Concerto pour clavecin en La Majeur, BWV 1055
3. Concert Brandebourgeois No. 1 en Fa Majeur, BWV 1046
4. Concerto pour quatre clavecins en Ré Mineur, BWV 1065