Goldberg nr. 39 (April 2006)

5 STARS       

One of the most delightful, and most earnest, essays in musical diplomacy must surely be Georg Muffat's Armonico Tributo, wherein in French, Italian and Austro-Germanic styles trip amiably through a succession of chamber sonatas in the concerto grosso style « suitable for many or for few instruments ». The multiplicity of accents is perfectly captured in a new recording by Les Muffatti, who elucidate the binary oppositions that form the crux of Muffat's argument (slow/fast, light/dense, solo/tutti, da chiesa/da camera, freedom/discipline) with a rarely-heard elegance et plasticity.
Listen to the dramatic chiaroscuro of the Allegro of the G-minor Sonata; the lightness and rhythmic vitality in the Gavotta of the A major; the superb playing in the multi-sectional Adagio of the E minor; or the varying palette of that beautiful, wistful homage to Lully, the Passagaglia of the last Sonata. Les Muffatti, comprising 10 string players and a continuo of double-bass, harpsichord, organ, guitar and theorbo, under the direction of Peter Van Heyghen, prove to be the perfect size to realising the concerto grosso textures with clarity and economy — without sacrificing the expressive possibilities.
The recorded sound is clean and richly detailed; my only gripe is the slightly recessed harpsichord. Van Heyghen's illuminating booklet essay, a model of rhetorical construction in itself, argues the case for Muffat's inclusion in a pantheon of major contributors to the development of the concerto grosso style that includes Corelli, Biber and (indirectely) Lully. This wonderful recording will surely go some way to furthering that cause.

William Yeoman