Virtuosity and Grace – Sonatas for Viola da Gamba
Carl Philipp Emanuel Bach (1714-1788)
Sonata in C major (Wq 136 / H558)
Johann Christian Bach (1735-1782)
Sonata in G major (Warb B 4b)
Carl Philipp Emanuel Bach
Sonata in D major (Wq 137 / H559)
Johann Christian Bach
Sonata in F major (Warb B 6b)
Carl Philipp Emanuel Bach
Sonata in G minor (Wq 88 / H510)
Johann Christian Bach
Sonata in B flat major (Warb B 2b)
Sonata in F major (Warb B 15b)
L’Amoroso
rec. 2022, Église Saint-Pierre, Vabres, France
Reviewed as a stereo 16/44 download with pdf booklet from Outhere
Arcana A543 [77]
The wider Bach family has been gradually emerging from the formidable shadow of Johann Sebastian with its members acquiring distinct personalities of their own. Even Johann Christoph Friedrich, very much the Zeppo of these musical Marx Brothers, has made it on to disc with a recording of his setting of the story of Lazarus. As much as JS’ sons have achieved any kind of character beyond mentions in biographies of their father, the conventional wisdom amongst non specialist listeners goes that Wilhelm Friedman was the maverick, Johann Christian was John the Baptist to Mozart’s Messiah and Carl Philipp Emmanuel was, well, a bit of a dull striver. There is some truth in all of these points apart from the last. WF’s modest output is full of wild things. JC is the crucial link between the gallant and Haydn. But the more we come to know the music CPE the more it comes to seem that the taste of his day which esteemed him above his brothers was probably right.
This new recording contrasts two of the brothers, JC and CPE, and allows us another perspective on this marvellous musical sibling rivalry. In many ways the works selected by Balestracci flesh out the provisional pen portraits I have just outlined. In the music of Johann Christian, one can hear musical classicism being born: textures are thinned out; chordal accompaniments replace polyphony; melodies are more clearly defined; and the emotional excesses of the era of the empfindsamer Stil (sensitive style) have been curbed.
The work of CPE looks backward as well as forward which in itself makes it very interesting now that most listeners know the music of JS Bach and that of Haydn and Mozart. His music is much more than a halfway house between two eras. If I state that his music is more complex than that of his brother Johann Christian, it will be argued back that JC’s music is deliberately less complex. Complexity, in itself, is no guarantee of quality but in the hands of Emmanuel Bach it makes for glorious music. Perhaps it is just a case of CPE’s style being a better fit, but I can’t resist thinking that the older brother wrote better and more idiomatically for the viola da gamba. Continuing this back and forth argument, it must be said that it is highly likely that these sonatas by Johann Christian weren’t originally written with the viola da gamba in mind where CPE was writing his for a renowned exponent of the instrument.
CPE’s music has just as cultured a sense of form and proportion as that of his brother, though with very different aesthetic priorities but CPE is better able to exploit the yearning character of the instrument. Again, in fairness to Johann Christian, his sonatas are that peculiar early Classical phenomenon, the keyboard sonata with (sometimes optional) string accompaniment of which Mozart left us numerous examples.
The sound of the viola da gamba is a hard one to describe since it has qualities of both the modern viola and of the modern cello. Played propped against the leg rather than projecting via a spike on the floor like a cello, its sound is much more intimate and the music written for it tends, as is the case with all the music included on this record, to the subtle and nuanced rather than the loud and showy. There is nonetheless plenty of virtuosity on show, not least in CPE Bach’s D major sonata. It is just that the world of this music feels more private than public.
If it seems to me that the time has come that we start thinking of Carl Philipp Emmanuel not as just a son of Sebastian but as an important and original voice in his own right, I do not wish the excellence of his music to become a stick to beat that of Johann Christian. I would prefer to praise both. If nothing else, the contrast between the pair makes for a wonderfully diverse programme on this wonderful disc.
If Guido Balestracci had played virtually any other instrument than the viola da gamba I reckon he would be a big star in the classical firmament. He plays with feeling, wit and, when required, fire. His handling of the all important emotional rhetoric of CPE Bach’s music is done with consummate and idiomatic flair, as graceful as it is passionate. He can also be the very model of the dashing young man in the Strand when it comes to the stylish music of the so called “London Bach”. His grasp of the capabilities of his instrument seems almost intuitive, perhaps reflecting the strange fact that he wanted to play this rarity of an instrument from the age of five.
The keyboard parts of the first two of the CPE sonatas are written as a figured bass and Paolo Corsi together with gambist Stéphanie Houillon fill them out with imagination and sparkle. Corsi moves between harpsichord and fortepiano from work to work and is equally adept at both.
There are probably more impressive works with which to persuade the novice listener to the cause of these two very different sons of the great Sebastian Bach but it is hard to imagine more seductive performances. Such is the artistry of Balestracci that he could illuminate any repertoire but meeting such wonderful, neglected music the results are all but irresistible.
David McDade
Previous review: Johan van Veen (July 2023)
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