Hearing the opening of Spring from The Four Seasons, with its secco style, dark coloring, and an attractive sounding archlute strumming away in the continuo, one might feel optimistic about this recording of Vivaldi’s 12 concertos devoted to the “contest between harmony and invention.” But when violin soloist Stefano Montanari makes his first entrance, all expectations fly out the window. Though Vivaldi’s concertos set a new dramatic standard for the concerto form, there are anything but undisciplined. Tell Montanari! His playing sounds entirely willful and capricious. He speeds up and slows down–way down–and indulges in a general taffy-pull with the music that goes beyond the bounds of interpretation. There are also curious happenings in the orchestra. Remember those ascending rocket figures in the violins, separated by quarter rests? Not here. The rests are filled with curious repetitions of the same figure, without any mention in the virtually worthless notes as to what’s going on textually!
The basic sound of this ensemble is really quite wonderful, and the intimate recording really lives up to the cover’s 24/96 proclamation. While the playing may well partake of a certain virtuoso bent, these bizarre interpretations simply cannot be recommended to anyone not thoroughly grounded in this music. We really need a good recording of the complete Il Cimento to replace the correct, but dry and somewhat boring Hogwood version. The Harmonia Mundi listed as a reference takes care of half the set, Nos. 1-6 (The Four Seasons plus “Il Piacere” and “La Tempesta di Mare”). Let’s hope those forces will get together to finish the excellent work they started. And one might well expect a recording soon from Fabio Biondi and his hot little Baroque band, Europa Galante, since they seem to be releasing regularly on the Virgin label. Based on what these forces did with L’Estro Armonico, that would be worth the wait.
