A beautiful album from 1998, “Songs” is a true handbook for Brad Mehldau’s piano art. He skillfully combines melodic sense and never-idle-virtuosity in the form of a song. Mehldau is often regarded as too conceptual but the listener shouldn’t be mislead by one of his peculiarities which is the ability to play jazz with the counterpoint technique as opposed to swing - once this is understood we are ready to be cradled by these ever so sweet tracks.
A good example of his virtuosity is the solo in track 2 “Unrequited” where the art of counterpoint applied to jazz reaches some of its highest peaks and the great independence of one hand from the other allows him to play an even tempo with his right hand and an odd one with his left. An awesome performance that grants him a place among the best jazz musicians of his generation.
As of 1717 Bach was in the court of Cöthen as a chapel master and that’s when he could honour the request of Christian Ludwig, who was the margrave of Branderburg, to write some music for his orchestra. The story goes that Bach could never hear his concerts for as long as he lived, as they laid forgotten in the margrave’s library.
In the six Branderburger Concerts the composer combines the lesson learnt from the italian examples (Vivaldi Corelli Albinoni and Alessandro Marcello) with strict counterpoint and some vocal music organization, imprinting a highly personal signature in this avant garde genre.
The concerts are structured following the current trend: the concerto grosso (the whole orchestra) is counterposed to the concertino (a small ensemble). As you can tell from the picture, in the third concert the concertino is missing as the string instuments are switching parts among themselves.
As far as assigning instruments, Bach deployed a color palette with few similar examples in late european baroque: a taste for timbre preciousness, for instruments’ choice and mixture, thus leading the italian concerto, widespread and appreciated due to international music publishers, to ever new heights.
Getting to the reviewing of this version, it must be noted that in the early 80’s Mr. Pinnock had recorded the Branderburgers, so you can imagine how surprised I was to hear about this new release. My first reaction was skeptical: hey, this director still wants to exploit the previous release’s success?
Well, after listening I see things differently; to beguin with, since it’s been some 30 years from the first version, greater confidence and a brighter orchestra timbre are clearly perceivable – musicians are now accustomed to playing antique instruments. Concerning Mr. Pinnock’s directing, what can I say? Simply divine, perfect, the rythm ever pressing, the blend between orchestra and soloists just astonishing. A master performance for a musical masterpiece that has no equals in baroque orchestra music.
