Geminiani : Pièces de clavecin (Hank Knox, clavecin)

Chronique

The Pièces de clavecin promised in the title of this release by Canadian harpsichordist Hank Knox are arrangements of violin sonatas by Francesco Geminiani, made by the composer himself and published in London in 1743. Such a thing was unusual enough in the 18th century, and Geminiani's pieces remained in print for decades. Nowadays the surprise listeners of Geminiani's time must have felt is probably hard to re-create, but the lover of Baroque keyboard music can't help but be intrigued as two very different genres are mashed together. Most of the pieces come from movements in sonatas in Geminiani's Op. 4 set. The violin line is given to the keyboard player's right hand. Both versions would have been ornamented, but Geminiani supplies the ornaments for the keyboard version, which are idiomatic to the harpsichord (Knox suggested that Geminiani, a violin virtuoso, became acquainted with French keyboard music during a stint in Paris in the 1730s) and differ from violin ornaments; owing to the violin's capacity for sustained tone, the harpsichord has a lot more space to fill and gets a more thoroughly encrusted line. Accordingly, each piece has a distinctive character, and the extraction of individual movements from what originally were sonatas and suites doesn't give the listener pause. The whole exercise sounds a bit mechanical, but the music is fetching in Knox's graceful readings, excecuted on a 1772 English harpsichord. The engineering from early-music.com, which deals in physical as well as online products, is clear and unfussy. Recommended for serious fans of the late Baroque.
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