Luigi Boccherini (1743-1805): 4 Symphonies, Opus 21

00:00 Symphony No. 1 in B flat major: Allegro assai - Andantino con moto - Presto assai 10:51 Symphony No. 3 in C major: Allegro assai - Larghetto sostenuto - Tempo di minuetto 22:15 Symphony No. 5 in B flat major: Allegro spiritoso - Andantino con moto - Vivace assai 32:25 Symphony No. 6 in A major: Allegro assai - Andantino grazioso - Tempo di minuetto Austrian Tonkünstler Orchestra, Vienna - Lee Schaenen, conductor In an age of great musical revivals the work of Luigi Boccherini (1743-1805) has been strangely bypassed. Of his nearly five hundred instrumental compositions, probably fewer than forty have been recorded. A great many compositions exist in manuscript only, thus far unpublished. This may, in part, be attributed to the malevolent star which shone over Boccherini’s career. Born in Lucca, Italy, the son of a double bass player, Boccherini studied in Rome where he developed into a well-known cello virtuoso. It was as a performer that he toured Italy and Southern France, finally reaching Paris where his virtuosity made him immediately fashionable. Journeying from there to Spain, he first suffered the King’s neglect but was later taken up by the Infante Don Luis, the King’s brother, and become the Infante’s protégé. In 1787 Boccherini went to Germany where he remained for ten years. After the death of his Prussian benefactor, Frederick William II, the composer returned to Spain. His second sojourn in Spain, however, was to be ill-starred. For a short time Napoleon’s brother, Lucien Buonaparte, then the French Ambassador to Madrid, showed an interest in him. Apart from this brief interlude, Boccherini’s career contained no further windfalls. Although he remained creative until his death, his fortunes declined steadily. The economic circumstances of his last years leave no doubt that he died in extreme poverty. In examining the reasons for his lack of success, attention is often focused on his out-of-the-way Spanish residence, the early decline in his fortunes, and a facility to compose so great that it led him into an occasional superficiality. Whatever the case may have been, the fact remains that universal recognition eluded Boccherini and, except for a few minor works, even after his death, he remained largely unknown. Many perspicacious musicians, among them the violinist Puppo (whose allusion to Boccherini being “the wife of Haydn” is today famous), were able to penetrate through Boccherini’s facility and to recognize the true value of his original thematic thinking. The symphonies on this record display both Boccherini’s virtues and his faults. Heretofore unpublished, they have been performed from a manuscript in the composer’s handwriting found in the Library of the Paris Conservatoire. The title page reads: “Sei Sinfonia (sic!) per due violini, viola e basso, oboi o flauti e corni, fatta per S.A.R. le Dn. Luigi Infante di Spagna Re: da Luigi Boccherini (1740-1787) Virtuoso di Camera, e compositore di S.A.R. le.” While the dates after Boccherini’s name are erroneous, there can be no doubt that this group of six symphonies, of which four are performed here, was written for the Infante Don Luis during Boccherini’s initial stay in Spain. Except for Symphony No. 1, in which oboes are replaced by flutes, the four symphonies recorded here are scored for oboes, horns, and strings. A different formal scheme is applied to two each of the four symphonies. In Symphonies Nos. 1 and 5, the traditional fast first sonata movement and the final rondo-like last movement, frame a cantabile slow second movement, and thus, more closely approach the classical formal scheme as it was to be developed by Haydn. Symphonies Nos. 3 and 6, on the other hand, take their formal construction from the immediate past. A fast sonata first movement is followed by a cantabile second movement. Here, one of Boccherini’s most original moments is revealed in the second movement of Symphony No. 3, in which a solo cello sings a hauntingly beautiful melody over and against that of its fellow strings. The final movements of both Symphonies Nos. 3 and 6, in the late post-baroque tradition, are stately minuets without obligato trio. Notes by FLORIAN GRASSMAYR Musical Heritage Society (MHS 651) 1965 Arte: Vista del palacio de Aranjuez desde la calle del Medio (1773), por Domingo de Aguirre Jiménez (1741-1804)