Скачать или смотреть Thomas Arne (1710-1778): 2 Keyboard Concertos

00:00 Concerto No 5 for Harpsichord & Orchestra in G minor: Largo, Allegro con spirito - Adagio - Vivace
14:16 Concerto No 4 for Organ & Orchestra in B flat major: Con spirito - Minuetto - Giga (Moderato)
(from “Six Favourite Concertos for the Organ, Harpsichord, or Piano-Forte with Instrumental Parts, for public and Private Concerts.”)

Lionel Salter, harpsichord & organ / Festival Strings Lucerne - Rudolf Baumgartner, conductor

Instrumentation:
No. 5: harpsichord solo, oboes I/II, violins I/II, viola, continuo (violoncello, double-bass, harpsichord)
No. 4: organ solo, oboes I/II, violins I/II, viola, continuo (violoncello, double-bass, harpsichord)

Recording: Zürich, Neumünsterkirche, 10/24-25/1963

Arne and Boyce were almost exact contemporaries. Both were born in 1710, Arne dying in 1778 and Boyce a year later. And as Dr. Burney wrote in his General History of Music ¨Mr. Arne and Mr. Boyce were frequently concurrents at the theatres and in each other's way¨. It was in fact in London's Royal theatres, Drury-Lane and Covent Garden, that one would have heard the concertos of Arne and symphonies of Boyce, though they also formed the staple musical fare in the pleasure gardens of Vauxhall, Marylebone and Ranelagh from the mid-18th century onwards.

Arne’s concertos were composed for his son Michael to play. In March, 1759, we learn from the newspapers of the day that father and son had a benefit performance at Drury-Lane which included ¨an organ concerto by Arne junior¨ (who was of course soloist, and not composer). Two years later the first performance of Arne’s oratorio Judith at Drury-Lane was advertised ¨with a concerto on the organ¨. Arne’s own instrument was the violin on which, according to Burney, he was a brilliant performer though rheumatism soon crippled his hand. His son Michael was a prodigy and later a virtuoso on keyboard instruments, and it is to this circumstance that we owe the six keyboard concertos, described on their title-page as being suit-able for “organ, harpsichord, or piano-forte”. The inclusion of the word “piano-forte” on the title-page is probably due to their late publication, for when Arne died they were still in manuscript. Some years later Michael Arne advertised a proposal for publishing them, but this came to nothing, possibly because during his lifetime the younger Arne was usually in debt and therefore not infrequently in prison. Luckily, however, the material of the concertos came into the possession of a Mr. Groombridge who published the solo and instrumental parts in 1793, fifteen years after the composer's death.

Arne’s concertos have little consistency of formal style. They show both a reflection of the baroque forms used by Handel in his concertos of a quarter of a century earlier and also the new influences which the Italian opera buffa had brought to England in the 1750's. The Concerto No. 5 in G minor opens with a Largo which derives from Lully’s French overtures as Handel had interpreted them in his concertos. It may also be noticed that the theme of the following Allegro bears a strong rhythmic resemblance to Handel's ¨O ruddier than the cherry¨, one of the few examples when Arne borrowed from music's arch-borrower. As in Handel’s concertos the development of this theme is entrusted almost entirely to the soloist without instrumental support, but at the conclusion the music looks forward romantically to the age of Mozart. There is a brief slow movement for soloist alone that displays Arne's gifts both for melody and ornamentation. The finale is in triple time with triplets that suggest 9/8 rather than 3/4. As in the first movement the soloist uses the technical device of the crossing of hands, and again the final episode looks forward to the romantic era.

The Fourth Concerto in B flat owes nothing to Handel in its opening movement. The thematic material suggests Italian opera buffa, though one also feels the influence of the brilliant young Leipzig composer and gamba-player Karl Friedrich Abel ([1725]-1787), who made England his home from 1759 onwards and who was later associated with Johann Christian Bach in a famous series of London concerts. Arne used a sinfonia by Abel as the overture to his pasticcio ¨Love in a village¨, and there is no doubt that he was influenced by Abel's galant style. Once again in this concerto triplets occupy an important part in the soloist's development of the material. Double bars and repeat signs suggest an embryonic sonata form with a repeated development section, while the instruction ‘ad libitum’ followed by a pause sign suggests an opportunity for a cadenza. The second movement is a minuet, and the finale is a Giga marked moderato.

JULIAN HERBAGE