Giovanni Battista Grillo: Complete Instrumental Music and Selected Motets, His Majestys Sagbutts & Cornetts, Jeremy West, treble cornett; Jamie Savan, treble and tenor cornetts; Bork-Frithjof Smith, treble cornett; Adam Woolf, alto and tenor sackbuts; Abigail Newman, alto and tenor sackbuts; Philip Dale, tenor sackbut; Andrew Harwood-White, bass sackbut; Stephen Saunders, bass and tenor sackbuts. Sfz Music SFZ0107 www.sfzmusic.co.uk. Group website www.hmsc.co.uk. Recorded in St. George's Church, Cambridge, 20-22 September 2006.

Listening to the latest release from His Majestys Sagbutts and Cornetts is a genuine pleasure on so many levels. Grillo was active in Venice in the early sixteenth century. Clearly the composer most often associated with that era and locale was Giovanni Gabrieli. This recording easily succeeds in demonstrating Grillo's worth.

Grillo succeeded Gabrieli as organist at the Scuola Grande di San Rocco in 1612 and held this position until his death in 1622. Additionally he freelanced as an organist at San Marco on major feast days in 1615 and 1617, playing under the direction of Claudio Monteverdi. In 1619 he was appointed first organist at San Marco. (Gabrieli had only been the second organist there).

Grillo's music is varied. One hears the cori spezzati style of Gabrieli's Venice as well as a more forward-looking concertato style (solo voices and basso continuo alternating with tutti voices) similar to the music of Monteverdi.

The playing on this disc is sublime. It may seem to be an exaggeration, but every single phrase has been carefully shaped. Ornaments are tasteful and elegantly performed. Blend both with instruments and vocalists (eight of the nineteen tracks include voices) is exceptionally fine. Throughout the disc players perform with a purely vocal style and do so with warmth and sensitivity.

Modern editions by Bernard Thomas for eight of the tracks have alredy been published by London Pro Music. The remaining eleven are now available from Sfz Editions and were prepared by Jamie Savan and Adam Woolf, both of whom are members of HMSC.

The personnel of His Majestys Sagbutts and Cornetts has changed over its twenty-five-year span. Indeed, only its founder, Jeremy West, and sackbut player Stephen Saunders are original members. However, one recognizes numerous players from many of the group's previous recordings.

The recording is performed at A=440 in quarter-comma mean tone. Cornetti used were made by Christopher Monk Instruments, John McCann, Christoph Schuler, and Serge Delmas. Sackbuts were made by Ewald Meinl, Egger Instruments, Glassi, and Frank Tomes.

This recording is essential to HBS members. It brings to light a neglected composer and in so doing, expands our repertoire significantly. Moreover, the playing is nothing short of exquisite. A breath of fresh air.

-- James Miller.

The Art of the High Baroque. World Premiere Recording on Baroque Trumpet. Robert "Bahb" Civiletti, baroque trumpet. The Belgian Baroque Soloists, Niranjan Wjewickrema, Conductor; Marie Haag, Catherine Meeus, baroque violins; Rainer Ardt, baroque viola; Eve Francois, baroque cello; Benoit Vanden Bemden, baroque bass viol; Sopie van Heerle, harpsichord; Stefanie Troffaes, Wim Vandenbossche, transverse flutes; Mark De Merlier, Frank Clarysse, natural horns; Alain De Rijckere, baroque bassoon. CD program notes, Edward Tarr. Buccina Cantorum Recordia BCR 3313114. Recorded 10-13 April 2007. www.tce-studio.com This email address is being protected from spambots. You need JavaScript enabled to view it.

This latest CD by Robert "Bahb" Civiletti is nothing short of remarkable. All six compositions on this recording are listed as “world premiere recordings on Baroque trumpet” and an examination of Lowry’s International Trumpet Discography bears out this claim. The works in question are Trumpet Concerto in D by Joseph Riepel (1709-1782), Trumpet Concerto in Eb by Franz Querfurth (fl. Mid-18th century), Trumpet Concerto No. 1 in C, Trumpet Concerto No. 2 in D by Georg von Reutter II (1708-1772), Trumpet Concerto in D by Franz Xaver Richter (1709-1789), and the Trumpet Concerto No. 1 in D by J. Michael Haydn (1737-1806). In some sense these works are like the famous Haydn Trumpet Concerto but on steroids. All are unbelievably virtuosic and demanding. Ed Tarr, in his thoughtful CD program notes states that the Michael Haydn D-major trumpet concerto has the distinction of presenting the "world record" height of sounding A above high C, in bar 41 of the first movement. The Richter concerto ascends to high concert G.

That this is the first time anyone has recorded these demanding pieces on baroque trumpet is no surprise and certainly puts Bob Civiletti in a very special category. Civiletti started his trumpet career as a lead jazz and commercial player and went on to help develop the "Tongue-Controlled Embouchure (TCE)" technique with the well-known “chop doc” Jerome Callet. His fantastic ability to control the very extreme high tessitura on the trumpet serves him well with this repertoire. However, these pieces are not played like a lead jazz trumpeter. Civiletti plays this repertoire with a great deal of style and sensitivity and the Belgian Baroque Soloists matched him in this regard.

The cadenza in the second movement of the Joseph Riepel D major concerto is one of the very few written out by the composer of a trumpet work of this period. It is short and has little thematic material from the composition. It is more of a brilliant flourish than a melodically developed cadenza as found in other repertoire. Civiletti uses this as a model for cadenzas in the other works. The cadenza played in the first movement of the Richter D major concerto echoes the extreme passage to the high G above C ending with an arpeggio down to the third harmonic, G below the staff.

This is somewhat of a landmark recording, the absolutely most demanding Baroque trumpet repertoire well played on a baroque trumpet. Bob Civiletti certainly sets the bar several notches higher for future players. Given the outstanding aspects of the performance one is almost hesitant to remark on any shortcomings. No landmark efforts are flawless. Certain extreme passages with difficult leaps are occasionally attacked in a less than perfect way and tone quality is sometimes affected. However, 100% technical perfection is not to be expected on a maiden voyage. Bob Civiletti performs with remarkable skill and musicianship and has shown the brass world that this repertoire is approachable on Baroque trumpet. The gauntlet has been thrown down. Having given us a view of the possibilities, maybe in the next generation trumpeters will perform these works on a natural trumpet with no vent holes and come even closer to a perfect performance. Until then, this recording is the closest we will come to knowing the sounds of the likes of the great Austrian trumpet virtuosos of that era such as Johann Heinisch (fl. 1725-51) and J.B. Resenberger (c. 1700-1781).

-- Jeffrey Nussbaum

Victorian Christmas; Passion des Cuivres, 2006; Orfeo C 689 061 A.
Obtained from JPC Shallplatten, www.jpc.de (website in English), scheduled for wider distribution in the Fall of 2007.

For generations, brass playing has been an important part of musical life in Great Britain, with many of the advances in instrument development paralleling the popularity of the brass bands. Indeed, the popularity of brass ensemble music in Britain was such that for the first time rural and working class people had plenty of opportunities to hear high quality music making in their own communities. The brass quintet Passion des Cuivre (rhymes with 'peeve'), based in Berlin and including members from that city as well as from Dresden and London, was formed to revive the culture of 19th-century brass chamber music, especially that of the aforementioned tradition. Many HBS members will recall their fine performances at the Vintage Band Festival in Northfield, Minnesota in 2006. Using cornets in place of trumpets, a simple F horn, narrow-bore trombone and ophicleide, they perform both original works and arrangements of selections written for larger ensembles of the period. Their fine musicianship on period instruments won them the Nikolaus Harnoncourt Prize in 2005. This CD, given the alternate title Victorian Christmas for Brass, is the group's first commercial recording.

The performers on this CD are Robert Vanryne, Neil Brough and Amanda Pepping alternating on cornets, Steffan Launer on horn, Bernhard Meyer on trombone, Erhard Schwartz on ophicleide, and guest vocalist Constanze Backes, soprano. Adjunct performers include the bell ringing team at St. Andrew's Church, Sonning. All instruments used are period examples, with the exception of Schwartz's ophicleide, which is a modern reproduction.

The recording opens with melodic peals of church bells, segueing into Arthur Sullivan's Christmas Bells at Sea, a fitting selection for opening an album of Victorian Christmas music. This is followed by another Sullivan selection, "Hearken Unto Me, My People," an anthem that was originally for organ and choir but works nicely with the warm sounds of period brass. Next is the traditional 1849 carol "Once in Royal David's City", where the first verse is played here by solo cornet instead of the boy soprano often used in English Christmas services. Two more traditional songs follow, with "God Rest You Merry Gentlemen" being given a familiar brass quintet treatment, and "Hark, the Herald Angels Sing" passing the melody to solo ophicleide.

Three baroque selections follow, the Sinfony (Overture) and "He Shall Feed His Flock" from Handel's Messiah, with Backes' clear soprano voice joining in on the latter. The ophicleide gets a virtuosic solo opportunity in the same composer's "O Ruddier Than the Cherry" from the dramatic opera Acis and Galatea. History's last great ophicleide virtuoso, Sam Hughes, took the bass aria written for the character Polyphemus and made the solo his own. Recalling the Hughes tradition of ophicleide artistry, Erhard Schwartz delivers a fine performance. Following are more traditional songs, "O Little Town of Bethlehem," "O Come All Ye Faithful," and "Carol of the Bells." Henry Purcell's "Evening Hymn", "Now That the Sun Hath Veil'd His Light," is revived here in a gentle treatment by vocalist Backes.

Adophe Adam's beautiful "O Holy Night," also known as "Cantique de Noël," is here given a lush and moving treatment with the melody on horn until a cornet duet takes over. Next is Arthur Sullivan's setting of "It Came Upon the Midnight Clear," better known outside of England in its alternate setting by Richard Willis. Five more traditional carols follow, including "Joy to the World," "The Coventry Carol," "In the Bleak Midwinter," "O Come, O Come Emmanuel," and "The Three Kings." Excerpted here from Sullivan's Christmas drawing-room extravaganza "The Miller and His Man" is the bumptious tune "Care is All Fiddle-De-Dee," wherein listeners are urged to throw caution to the winds and indulge the excesses of the festive season. The recording concludes with another version of Christmas Bells at Sea, this time with ophicleide solo, segueing into the closing peals of church bells.

This CD was nicely recorded by Bayerischen Rundfunk, in a space that gives a nice light ambience. The playing is up to the high standard set by other top brass quintets, and is a delight to listen to. As a recreation of Victorian brass playing, the performers have done a commendable job, with the less strident and warm sound of 19th Century brass complementing the material. This recording also presents a fine example of solo ophicleide playing, and indeed no other instrument takes as many solos. This is also an excellent and very enjoyable Christmas album in its own right. Highly recommended.

--Paul Schmidt

Music of a Golden Age. Australian Baroque Brass, John Foster, Director. Tubicium Records TR761901.
Info: www.australianbaroquebrass.com. Recorded 2005 and 2006. Natural trumpets: John Foster, Martin Phillipson, David Musk, Peter Miller, Joshua Clarke, Yoram Levy, Matthew Manchester, Samantha Robinson, Julian Brun, Andrew Evans. Sackbuts: Scott Kinmont, Brett Favell, Warrick Tyrell, Nigel Crocker, Gregory Van der Struik. Classical flutes: Melissia Farrow, Mikaela Oberg. Baroque cello: Anthea Cottee. Timpani: Richard Miller. Percussion: John Douglas. Organ: David Drury.

The Australian Baroque Brass Ensemble was formed in 2003 under the direction of trumpet virtuoso John Foster. This recording offers a program of 15 pieces, the majority of which feature the trumpet ensemble, but it also includes repertoire featuring other instrumentations. The ensemble is solidly musical and performs with great enthusiasm and virtuosity. The well-known pieces that feature the trumpet ensemble include Monteverdi's Toccata from L'Orfeo, the Biber Sonata Sancti Polycarpi, and his Sonata á 7, C.P.E. Bach's Marche, the Aufzug aus Musikalische Schlittenfahrt by Leopold Mozart, Altenburg's Concerto á VII, and three anonymous fanfares. Involving other forces, the CD includes; Mozart's Divertimento No. 6, K. 188, Sonata for 4 trombones by Speer, the Aira Offen euch, ihr beiden Ohren from Cantata 175, and a lovely praeludium for organ by Buxtehude. John Foster covers most of the solo spots and performs with great clarity and precision. His performance on Scartatti's Mio tesoro per te moro is gorgeous and he matches the florid and brilliant singing of Anna Sandstrom with wonderful results. His use of ornamentation is also very effective.

The biography in the liner notes mentions Foster's impressive performance history as well as his involvement with Naumann trumpets. The instruments used are not mentioned but I gather they are vented trumpets. The notes also indicate that some ensemble members also play cornetti. Perhaps their next recording might feature some cornett repertoire. Still, this present recording does offer an enjoyable and wide ranging program of works that feature brass, from the wonderful "standards" to some less well-known but beautiful and beautifully played pieces.

-- Jeffrey Nussbaum