The six concerti grossi assembled on this disc come from Georg Muffat’s last published collection of secular concertos, dating from 1701. If you enjoy Corelli’s, Geminiani’s, or Handel’s string concertos, you’ll also relish these. Muffat achieves a cross-fertilization of each of these composers in his own works, and there’s a discernible French influence, strongly suggestive of Lully (with whom he studied as a youth) and Rameau, which is particularly apparent in the grave Sarabande of the G minor concerto. Muffat also provided the concertos with titles (these include “Good News”, “Watchful heart”, “Sweet sleep”, and “The World”), none of which has much relevance to musical content but which may have had some connection to the circumstances surrounding the first performances.
The Bratislava-based group Musica Aeterna offers stylish and cleanly articulated readings of these rarities at an attractive budget price. Sonically, this disc rates somewhat less highly, but there are no other identical compilations of Muffat concertos available. The nearest you’ll find are Roy Goodman’s accounts with the ensemble Chaconne (Hyperion) of several of the remaining 1701 works omitted from this Naxos issue, which almost certainly are destined for follow-up attention. Goodman’s team also sounds more closely integrated than the Bratislava musicians, but that’s probably due to the more reverberant recording location.
