The Elegant Bassoon by Wouter Verschuren

Various composers

Wouter Verschuren

The Elegant Bassoon

Price: € 19.95
Format: CD
Label: Globe
UPC: 8711525526600
Catnr: GLO 5266
Release date: 11 November 2016
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Label
Globe

UPC
8711525526600

Catalogue number
GLO 5266

Release date
11 November 2016

"It sounds like the first day of spring. I recommend it highly."

Fanfare Magazine, 21-9-2017

Album

Artist(s)

Composer(s)

Press

About the album

Dedicated entirely to the baroque bassoon The Elegant Bassoon features a rich variety of repertoire dating from the earliest days of the instrument’s existence, until the period in which the classical bassoon took over.
Bassoonist Wouter Verschuren and Concerto Delaborde here present the instrument in exciting unusual ensembles, like bassoon and traverso or viola da gamba. The reason that these combinations of instruments were not used often in the past, lies in the fact that traverso and viola da gamba favor keys with sharps, such as D major, whereas the bassoon favors keys with flats, like F major. This album contains 6 world premiere recordings.

De geschiedenis van de barokfagot in 10 werken
The Elegant Bassoon is volledig toegewijd aan de barokfagot, een bevat een divers repertoire, afkomstig van de eerste dagen van het bestaan van het instrument, tot aan de periode waarin de klassieke fagot zijn plaats innam.

Fagottist Wouter Verschuren en Concerto Delaborde (met de traversospeler Wilbert Hazelzet) presenteren het instrument in tien werken, waaronder 6 wereldpremières, in opwindende en ongewone ensembles, zoals fagot en flauto traverso of viola da gamba. De reden dat deze combinaties van instrumenten in het verleden niet vaak gebruikt werden, ligt in het feit dat de traverso en viola da gamba bij voorkeur gebruikt worden voor werken in toonsoorten met kruizen, zoals D groot. Voor de fagot wordt daarentegen de voorkeur gegeven aan toonsoorten met mollen, zoals F groot.

Ganz dem barocken Fagott gewidmet bietet The Elegant Bassoon eine große Fülle an Repertoire, von den ersten Tagen des Instrumentes bis in die Zeit, in der das klassische Fagott dominierte.
Fagottist Wouter Verschuren und Concerto Delaborde präsentieren das Instrument in aufregenden, ungewöhnlichen Ensembles wie Fagott und Traversflöte oder Viola da Gamba. Der Grund, aus dem diese Kombinationen in der Vergangenheit nicht oft eingegangen wurden, ist der, dass sowohl die Traversflöte als auch die Viola da Gamba sich in Kreuztonarten wie D-Dur wohlfühlen, wohingegen das Fagott B-Tonarten wie F-Dur bevorzugt. Auf diesem Album hören Sie sechs Welterstaufnahmen.

Artist(s)

Wouter Verschuren (bassoon)

Wouter Verschuren graduated from the Royal Conservatory in The Hague. He studied baroque and classical bassoon with Donna Agrell. Wouter is sought after in the Netherlands and abroad as a bassoonist, and is equally at home with repertoire ranging from the Renaissance to the Romantic. He is principal bassoonist of The Amsterdam Baroque Orchestra conducted by Ton Koopman, and regularly plays with other renowned period orchestras. In addition, he regularly appears as a soloist, and plays in numerous international chamber music ensembles such as Caecilia-Concert, specializing in performance and research of 17th century music, and can be heard on countless CDs. Wouter teaches at the Royal Conservatory in The Hague and at the Utrecht Conservatory.

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Concerto Delaborde

Antoinette Lohmann (violin)

ANTOINETTE LOHMANN (AMSTERDAM, 1969) studied violin, viola and historical violin at the Amsterdam Conservatory. Antoinette has been active in a variety of musical areas, including Argentinian tango, salon music, folk music and contemporary music. She has performed and recorded with many orchestras and ensembles over the years. Currently her repertoire extends from the early 17th to the 21st century, always performed from a historically informed perspective. She has a special interest in unusual instruments such as the viola d’amore, the tenor violin, the violino piccolo and the viola pomposa. She is also a keen performer of contemporary compositions for historical instruments. Her main focus is on reviving forgotten chamber music, with special emphasis on Dutch repertoire. She has recorded chamber music by Joseph Martin Kraus, Margarethe Danzi, Franz Danzi, Franz Krommer, Belle van Zuylen and Dutch and German music of the early baroque. Antoinette teaches historical violin and viola as a principal study at the HKU Utrecht Conservatorium and the Conservatorium van Amsterdam. She is also the principal teacher of the Historical Performance department in Utrecht. Antoinette recorded these works on a late 17th-century violin by Egidius Snoeck (Brussels), which is still in its original baroque set-up, using four pure gut strings.

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Kathryn Cok (harpsichord)

Kathryn Cok pursues a varied career as a harpsichordist, fortepianist and academic on both sides of the Atlantic. She is well sought after both as a soloist as well as a continuo player. Born in the city of New York, USA, Kathryn now lives in The Hague, Holland where she completed a Masters degree at the Royal Conservatory as a student of Ton Koopman and Tini Mathot on the harpsichord, and Bart van Oort on the fortepiano. Kathryn recently won first prize in the first solo competition for baroque instruments in Brunnenthal, Austria. She works regularly as a soloist and continuo player with the Amsterdam Baroque Orchestra, and other important early music ensembles in Europe and performs regularly as...

Kathryn Cok pursues a varied career as a harpsichordist, fortepianist and academic on both sides of the Atlantic. She is well sought after both as a soloist as well as a continuo player. Born in the city of New York, USA, Kathryn now lives in The Hague, Holland where she completed a Masters degree at the Royal Conservatory as a student of Ton Koopman and Tini Mathot on the harpsichord, and Bart van Oort on the fortepiano. Kathryn recently won first prize in the first solo competition for baroque instruments in Brunnenthal, Austria. She works regularly as a soloist and continuo player with the Amsterdam Baroque Orchestra, and other important early music ensembles in Europe and performs regularly as a soloist in many of the world’s most renowned Early Music Festivals such as Oude Muziek, Utrecht, Brunnenthaler Concert Zomer, Bodensee Festival, and important keyboard collections in the UK such as the Cobbe Collection, Finchcock’s, Fenton House and the Gemeente Museum, Holland. She is co-founder of the Caecilia-Concert, a dynamic international group of instrumentalists specializing in performance and research of 17th century music for instruments and voices. Kathryn is busy as a researcher and teaches at the Royal Conservatory in The Hague, Holland.

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Wilbert Hazelzet (flute)

Kate Clark (flute)

Robert Smith (cello)

Composer(s)

Carl Philipp Emanuel Bach

It can't be easy to have been a son of the great Johann Sebastian Bach. Bach was undoubtedly very strict, and if you'd have any composition ambitions, you would have to find a way to step out of the shadow of your father. Luckily, his sons had everything going for them considering their music. Whereas the traditional Baroque music of their father slowly went out of fashion, most of Bach's sons managed to follow the new trends of the early Classicism. In other words: relatively simple, melodic music which is not too heavy on the listener, yet still very passionate. Carl Philipp Emanuel, Bach's fifth son, became the most outstanding among his siblings. Like each of Bach's sons, he received a...

Carl Philipp Emanuel, Bach's fifth son, became the most outstanding among his siblings. Like each of Bach's sons, he received a solid education from his father, en Carl Philipp developed into a remarkably talented keyboardist. Moreover, he became a prolific composer and of all Bach's sons, he was able to came closest to the quality of his father's work, albeit in a completely different style.

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Georg Philipp Telemann

Georg Philipp Telemann (14 March 1681 – 25 June 1767) was a German Baroque composer and multi-instrumentalist. Almost completely self-taught in music, he became a composer against his family's wishes. After studying in Magdeburg, Zellerfeld, and Hildesheim, Telemann entered the University of Leipzig to study law, but eventually settled on a career in music. He held important positions in Leipzig, Sorau, Eisenach, and Frankfurt before settling in Hamburg in 1721, where he became musical director of the city's five main churches. While Telemann's career prospered, his personal life was always troubled: his first wife died only a few months after their marriage, and his second wife had extramarital affairs and accumulated a large gambling debt before leaving Telemann.
Telemann was one of the most prolific composers in history (at least in terms of surviving oeuvre) and was considered by his contemporaries to be one of the leading German composers of the time—he was compared favorably both to his friend Johann Sebastian Bach, who made Telemann the godfather and namesake of his son Carl Philipp Emanuel, and to George Frideric Handel, whom Telemann also knew personally. Telemann's music incorporates several national styles (French, Italian) and is even at times influenced by Polish popular music. He remained at the forefront of all new musical tendencies and his music is an important link between the late Baroque and early Classical styles.

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Johann Friedrich Fasch

Theodor Schwartzkopff

Johann Georg Tiehl

François Devienne

Press

It sounds like the first day of spring. I recommend it highly.
Fanfare Magazine, 21-9-2017

Verschuren plays convincingly and interpreted into each piece a different voice and function.
Luister, 03-2-2017

Though the bassoonist delivers a stellar account of the Sonatina Quinta in a minor, it is the Sonata a 4 in d minor from Tafelmusik that is the CDʼs highlight.
Early Music America, 09-1-2017

Bassoonist Wouter Verschuren combines virtuosity with expression, violinist Antoinette Lohmann, traverso players Wilbert Hazelzet and Kate Clark and cellist and gambist Robert Smith together with engaging game that forces him to listen.
Tom tijdschrift oudemuziek, 01-1-2017