Simply Biber (Channel Classics/Outhere Music)
★★★★☆
🎧 Channel Classics (Avail to pre-order as of Might 23)
For those who had informed me at first of the week that I’d nonetheless be listening to Biber on Friday, my response would have been dusty and unprintable. Center-European music earlier than Johann Sebastian Bach has about as a lot curiosity for me as a squeezed-out tube of toothpaste.
The world of Heinrich Biber, a Salzburg violin composer within the Italian fashion, was rendered out of date by the start in 1785 of Bach and Handel. Biber stored plugging away till 1704, nearly lengthy sufficient to see himself dwarfed by genius. His music, as a lot as I’ve heard, is unadventurous and ingratiating, nice sufficient however numbing after some time because the ear cries out for selection.
Briefly, not my form of composer.
What modifications my thoughts on this album is the slinky, fun-loving taking part in fashion of violinist Rachel Podger and the Brecon Baroque interval instrumentalists. I’m guessing these musicians play standing up as a result of there’s a bounciness to the six sonatas that I’ve not heard earlier than in Biber. It’s recent, athletic, teasing and a bit gravelly right here and there to maintain my consideration between smoothie chords. Podger is completely on her toes, a difficult chief with a thoughts of her personal. I collect she’s going to be main Simon Rattle’s Baroque ensemble in Munich subsequent season.
Did I point out the humour? There are a few good jokes within the music and the album title seems to consult with an obscure Canadian singer, recently occluded by political occasions in his nation.
What’s to not like?
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Norman Lebrecht is without doubt one of the most widely-read commentators on music, tradition and cultural politics. He’s an everyday presenter on BBC Radio 3 and a contributor to the Wall Road Journal, Bloomberg, Standpoint, Sinfini and different publications. His weblog, Slipped Disc, is among the many most generally learn cultural websites on-line, breaking unique tales and campaigning towards human abuse and acts of injustice within the cultural industries.
