Composer: George Frideric Handel
Performer: Berlin Barock Solisten
Conductor: Reinhard Goebel
Format: FLAC (tracks)
Label: Hänssler
Release: 2019
Size: 1.32 GB
Recovery: +3%
Scan: yes
Handel: Concerto No 1 in B flat major HWV 312
01. I. Allegro
02. II. Largo
03. III. Allegro
Handel: Concerto No 2 in B flat major HWV 313
04. I. Vivace – Grave
05. II. Largo
06. III. Allegro
07. IV. Menuett
08.V. Gavotte
Handel: Concerto No 3 in G major HWV 3149
09. I. Largo e staccato – Allegro
10. II. Adagio
11. III. Allegro
Handel: Concerto No 4(b) in F major HWV 315
12. I. Andante – Allegro
13. II. Andante
14. III. Allegro
15. IV. Minuetto
Handel: Concerto No 5 in D minor HWV 316
16. I.
17. II. Allegro
18. III. Adagio
19. IV. Allegro ma non tropüpo
20.V. Allegro
Handel: Concerto No 6 in D major HWV 317
21. I. Vivace
22. II. Allegro
Concerto No 4(a) in F major HWV Anh. B 319
23. I. Largo
24. II. Allegro
25. III. Largo
26. IV. Allegro
In the “Concerti Opus 3” Handel prescribes the standard orchestra for the late Baroque era: two oboes, strings and a continuo group. However, we learn from the solo-tutti supplements and the court account books that the ensemble was in fact larger and more polyphonic than the original, simple manuscript and the subsequent modern score suggest: occasionally the number of bassoons was equal to that of the cellos, though they were only given solo parts when they were disengaged from the bass group of instruments. It was common practice too – not in Cöthen or Hamburg, it is true, but certainly in Dresden, Paris and London – for at least two if not three oboists to be assigned to each part, these being augmented by special instruments such as the old-style recorder and the new transverse flute, and after 1750 the Clarinet. The Concerto Opus 3, no. 1 requires a total of six obbligato wind instruments (two oboes, two recorders and two bassoons) and is therefore no “odd man out” composition, but rather reproduces fairly accurately the minimum range that an orchestra at Handel’s disposal would have comprised: in the middle movement of the concerto, two ripieno oboists take up recorders, and then return to the fold as oboists afterwards.