Lest one go through life thinking that Baroque music was only about pure, noble, and elevated thoughts and events, this collection will provide quite another view. It presents compositions that musically depict very normal, everyday happenings. Johann Fischer’s piece is an ode to a salt factory; Telemann’s suite is a gossipy commentary about the latest literature of the day (Gulliver’s Travels). Marin Marais uses a spoken narration and basson continuo to tell the story of a painful operation; and one of Johann Schmelzer’s pieces is about a fencing school (with another operation as its final outcome!). The most amusing is Schmelzer’s other short piece, which glorifies passing gas with the help of a very rude and invasive bassoon that interrupts bucolic string passages. All of this music is played with verve and energy by the nine musicians of Berliner Barock Compagney. They seem to be having a good time, so the listener does too. The recording is close and just a trifle edgy. Alas, there is no English translation of the narration in the Marais piece, just a German one.
