Bernhard Hofstötter, Bozhena Korchynska & Mariya Bil - Baron: Music for Lute Solo & Lute and Recorder (2022) [24/44]

Though the music of Ernst Gottlieb Baron (1696–1760) is scarcely known to the wider public, the complete edition of his surviving compositions presented by Jan W.J. Burgers in 2005 (which forms the basis for the recordings on this CD) offers an excellent opportunity to study and perform the works of this late Baroque master and restore them to the status they deserve.

Though it can be assumed a large portion of his work was lost, with around a dozen suites for solo lute and ten ensemble pieces with obbligato lute, Baron’s extant oeuvre is nonetheless substantial.

In the solo compositions, we predominantly find short, mostly two-part pieces in a late Baroque idiom. While these ‘simple’ suites, likely intended for pupils, offer little justification for Baron’s contemporaries having ranked him among the most important German composers of his day, the solo compositions also include works of a very different quality. The first four movements of the Suite [Partie] in F recorded here draw on wide-ranging melodic arcs and expressive modulations. The Suite [Sonata] in B flat is a special case: it is attributed by the original copyist to Silvius Leopold Weiss, and to Baron only by a later copyist (apparently J.G.I. Breitkopf). But it has been rightly pointed out that the presumed authorship of Weiss does not stand up to a stylistic comparison.

Baron’s ensemble works include eight suites or sonatas for lute and melody instrument (recorder, transverse flute, violin or oboe), with a cello at times added as a bass part. In some of these works the treatment of the lute part is particularly virtuosic, assigning the lute an important role in the melodic composition. Baron’s surviving chamber music shows him as a master of the ‘galant’ style and offers attractive and original music from a time in which the lute was already losing ground before disappearing completely from concert life in the second half of the 18th century, soon after Baron’s death.

Ernst Gottlieb Baron (1696 –1760) was a German lutenist, composer and writer on music. Baron was born in Breslau into the family of Michael Baron, a maker of gold lace. He showed an inclination to music from an early age, and later made it his profession. He studied lute from about 1710 with a Bohemian named Kohott, and from 1715 attended the University of Leipzig, where he studied philosophy and law. He spent the period from 1719 to 1728 in travels from one small court to another. He visited Halle, Köthen, Schleiz, Saalfeld and Rudolstadt, Kassel, Fulda, Würzburg, Nuremberg and Regensburg, returning in 1727 to Nuremberg where he published his "Historisch-theoretische und practische Untersuchung des Instruments der Lauten", the work for which he is principally remembered. In 1737 he joined the musical ensemble of Crown Prince Frederick of Prussia as a theorbist, where he remained till his death.

This new recording presents works for lute solo, or in combination with other instruments: solo sonatas, a concerto for lute, flute and cello, a concerto for lute and recorder, a concerto for lute, oboe and cello and other works. They show Baron as a master of the "galant" style and offer attractive and original music from a time when the lute was losing ground before it was to disappear completely from concert life in the second half of the 18th century, soon after Baron's death.

Played on period instruments by Bozhena Korchynska (recorder) and Mariya Bil (cello) and Bernhard Hofstötter (lute), whose previous recordings for Brilliant Classics by Ludovico Roncalli (95856), (Francois Campion (95276) and The Baroque Lute in Vienna (95087)) received excellent reviews. Gramophone about his Weiss recording: "some of the most sympathetic and beautiful Weiss-playing yet committed to disc".

Tracklist:
01. Baron: Concerto for Lute and Recorder in D Minor: I. Adagio
02. Baron: Concerto for Lute and Recorder in D Minor: II. Allegro
03. Baron: Concerto for Lute and Recorder in D Minor: III. Siciliana
04. Baron: Concerto for Lute and Recorder in D Minor: IV. Gigue
05. Baron: Concerto for­ Lute, Flute and Cello in G Major: I. Concerto
06. Baron: Concerto for­ Lute, Flute and Cello in G Major: II. Largo
07. Baron: Concerto for­ Lute, Flute and Cello in G Major: III. Allegro
08. Baron: Sonata for Lute solo in B-Flat Major: I. Fantasia
09. Baron: Sonata for Lute solo in B-Flat Major: II. Allegro
10. Baron: Sonata for Lute solo in B-Flat Major: III. Bourée
11. Baron: Sonata for Lute solo in B-Flat Major: IV. Aria
12. Baron: Sonata for Lute solo in B-Flat Major: V. Rondeau
13. Baron: Sonata for Lute solo in B-Flat Major: VI. Tempo di Menuet
14. Baron: Sonata for Lute and Flute in G Major: I. Allemande
15. Baron: Sonata for Lute and Flute in G Major: II. Courante
16. Baron: Sonata for Lute and Flute in G Major: III. March
17. Baron: Sonata for Lute and Flute in G Major: IV. Menuet avec Trio
18. Baron: Sonata for Lute and Flute in G Major: V. Loure
19. Baron: Sonata for Lute and Flute in G Major: VI. Gigue
20. Baron: Partie for Lute Solo in F Major: I. Entrée
21. Baron: Partie for Lute Solo in F Major: II. Poco Allegro
22. Baron: Partie for Lute Solo in F Major: III. Sarabande Adagio
23. Baron: Partie for Lute Solo in F Major: IV. Menuet
24. Baron: Concerto for Lute, Oboe and Cello in C Minor: I. Concerto
25. Baron: Concerto for Lute, Oboe and Cello in C Minor: II. Molto Adagio
26. Baron: Concerto for Lute, Oboe and Cello in C Minor: III. Vivace
27. Baron: Duet for Lute and Flute in G Major: I. Allegro
28. Baron: Duet for Lute and Flute in G Major: II. Adagio
29. Baron: Duet for Lute and Flute in G Major: III. Presto


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