Patrice Mathews offers a finely gauged program of Scarlatti sonatas, containing more than a few lesser-known pieces alongside some of the more familiar ones. The opening and closing numbers (K. 24 and K. 532), and such jovial pieces as the G major Sonata K. 413 show that she certainly has the measure of the music's brilliance, but in general she doesn't seem to be interested in virtuosity for its own sake. Some of her tempos, such as for the E minor Sonata K. 147, or that of the C-sharp minor Sonata K. 247, come across as quite deliberate, and Mathews clearly relishes the crunching dissonances and spicy harmonic colorations with which Scarlatti peppers this music. In the slower sonatas, such as the D minor Andante K. 213 or the Andante Allegro K. 151 (here decidedly more Andante than Allegro), the sparseness of line often gives these works a strikingly modern feel, almost like a sort of Baroque, late Shostakovich.

Certainly Mathews' choice of instrument (a copy of 18th-century Florentine models by album producer John Philips) as well as the way that it's recorded (up close in a comparatively dry acoustic) contribute to the generally austere impression. With its extreme clarity of sound, rapid tonal decay, and (miraculous!) near total absence of mechanical noise, this particular harpsichord often evokes the sound of a guitar or lute, and so not only gets to the heart of Scarlatti's inspiration for much of this music, but seems especially appropriate to Mathews' inward looking approach. Don't assume by these comments that the performances actively shun brilliance: far from it. But you may find in this recital a more pensive, emotionally ambivalent composer than we have come to expect, and for that reason alone Mathews is certainly worth hearing. The only drawback: wholly inadequate notes whose superficiality is strikingly at odds with the music-making.

--David Hurwitz