Cello Concerto in A major 'The Frog', G475 (Boccherini) - from CDA68444 - Hyperion Records

Reviews

‘Isserlis plays ravishingly throughout this recital. His tone is as luminous at the bottom as it is up top (and Boccherini spends a lot of time in the stratosphere). Although he’s partnered in the concertos by members of the OAE, Isserlis is no slave to scholarship: there’s plenty of vibrato in the solo line, and the result is wonderfully engaging … if you already love Boccherini, you’ll be more convinced than ever that he’s a master. If you’re a sceptic: well, prepare to be seduced’ (Gramophone)

‘The OAE and soloist-director Steven Isserlis open with the D major Cello Concerto G479, a sunny work that suits Isserlis’s effervescent persona … Boccherini (himself a virtuoso cellist) showcases his instrument’s ability to soar into the stratosphere … nothing daunted, Isserlis produces a sweet cantabile sound even at the dizzying high end of the fingerboard … Isserlis and friends entwine Boccherini’s lyrical strands into a felicitous musical conversation: balanced, measured and fully in keeping with his gallant idiom’ (BBC Music Magazine)

PERFORMANCE

RECORDING

‘Why is the album called ‘Music of the Angels’? The sheer beauty and virtuosity of the music and the way, as Isserlis puts it, Boccherini’s 'ultra-light scoring'—sometimes with just cello and violins—leaves the cellist sharing the same stratosphere as they do. As he puts it, a 'remarkably translucent and ethereal’ effect; truly, music of the angels. It’s a lovely album’ (BBC Record Review)

‘The music above all is mellifluous, flowing with a natural ease and a lively disposition no doubt boosted by the 18th-century Italian’s long years in the fiery sunshine of Spain … [Isserlis] and his Enlightenment chums skip along, gracefully sigh, or do anything else required by music that regularly changes mood without losing its elegant poise. Buy this album immediately, for Boccherini’s music, like good bath salts, stimulates and relaxes at the same time’ (The Times)

‘A 19th-century musical dictionary observed that if God ever listened to music for pleasure, the composer he’d pick would be Boccherini. Isserlis and the Orchestra of the Age of Enlightenment’s album doesn’t make the choice seem impossible. The music flows with a natural ease and a lively disposition, and often exploits the cello’s top register, requiring extra dexterity. No problem for Isserlis’ (The Times)

‘The craftsmanship of Boccherini’s music is absolute, with everything held in perfect balance, extremes skirted and dramatic ferment studiously avoided … the sequence closes with Boccherini’s greatest hit … here all Boccherini’s virtues are on full display: easy melodicism, harmonic sweetness, exquisite string textures and a personal sound world’ (The Strad)

‘British cellist Steven Isserlis lovingly addresses the diversely elegant art of Luigi Boccherini (1743-1805) whose chamber music and cello concertos reflect his long tenure in Spain … exquisitely delicate and charming, this music dances on the strings of both the heart and the imagination’ (Audiophile Audition, USA)» More

‘There is much to enjoy in this new Isserlis release devoted entirely to Boccherini … the quintet tracks are personal preferences’ (The Rehearsal Studio, USA)

‘With this exceptionally lovely collection of concertos and chamber music, cellist Steven Isserlis seeks to support his argument that composer Luigi Boccherini always sought 'to create for his players and listeners a sphere of ideal beauty, of sophisticated sentiments—and in that he succeeded like no other' … a powerful argument for Boccherini’s importance. Highly recommended’ (CD Hotlist, USA)

‘Name two works by Boccherini ..! OK, I know you can, but many people would rattle off the ubiquitous Minuet with ease and then rack their brains to find a second. Steven Isserlis is very aware of this, and his new recording ‘Music of the Angels’ with the Orchestra of the Age of Enlightenment presents a selection of Boccherini’s works with cello in order to help round out the picture of this graceful, elegant composer. It’s a surprisingly chamber-oriented album, with even the two cello concertos inhabiting an astonishingly delicate, translucent sound-world … Steven Isserlis is a man with a wry sense of humour—his programme-notes are dotted with witty asides … he gets the last laugh on the listener by selecting as his encore the very same Minuet whose over-use he has earlier bemoaned. Although he probably gleefully expects everyone to be sick and tired of this piece, it’s actually a surprisingly refreshing note on which to end—and it’s particularly good to hear it contextualised by the preceding five full-scale works rather than just wheeled out in isolation’ (Presto Classical)» More

„Steven Isserlis macht vom ersten Moment an klar, dass es ihm vor allem auf eine gesangliche Darstellung ankommt. Dabei entstehen einige äußerst poetische Momente … Das Orchestra of the Age of Enlightenment unterstützt den Ansatz des Solisten in allen Belangen. Es spielt sehr fein und agil und zeigt, dass Boccherinis Kunst des Gefälligen viele unterschiedliche Schattierungen kennt … Die neue Aufnahme zeigt Luigi Boccherini als einen in den unterschiedlichen Besetzungen sehr wandlungsfähigen Komponisten. Das macht dieses Album erfreulich kurzweilig, zumal sich Steven Isserlis als ein ebenso kundiger wie kultivierter Führer durch diese Klangwelten erweist“ (NDR Kultur, Germany)

Introduction
English

Boccherini’s cello concertos, some twelve in number, were written comparatively early in his career, all dating from the years during which he toured as a virtuoso. And by the way: what a virtuoso! Presuming that he could play his own music—which I think is a fair presumption—he must have been a truly wonderful player; one can feel it in the writing, as challenging as anything composed for the cello before the twentieth century, at least. (The great Russian cellist Gregor Piatigorsky, an avid Boccheriniphile, considered Boccherini to have been, on the evidence of his music, the greatest cellist of all time.)

The Cello Concerto in A major, G475, known as ‘The Frog’ because of the leaping intervals of one of the soloist’s thematic passages in the finale (from 0'40), seems to date from Boccherini’s earlier years. (Actually, I confess: it hasn’t yet been known as ‘The Frog’—or as anything else, in fact, as far as I know, but I do think that those passages in the finale sound like a frog. And I’m curious to know whether giving a nickname to a little-known work such as this concerto might (deservedly) increase its popularity. I want to see, in short, whether this nickname has legs …) Maybe it was even the concerto concerning which Puccini senior noted in his diary on 4 August 1756 that he had paid Boccherini for giving three performances ‘the day after the first Psalm, and then to oblige me, at Mass and Vespers’. Or if that is too early for such a mature work, perhaps it is the concerto ‘in a completely new style’ (according to a contemporary report) which he played in Florence on 19 March 1761, at the age of eighteen. Possibly related, the only early source for the work is to be found today in Florence—albeit a copy rather than an original manuscript (including a cadenza which, uninspired as it is, cannot be, in my opinion, the work of the composer—just as the cadenzas found in the manuscript of Haydn’s cello concerto in C are definitely not Haydn’s). Given the lack of a source in Boccherini’s hand, and the fact that it was published only after his death, the concerto’s authenticity was questioned for a time; but since the material of the first movement is recycled in one of Boccherini’s cello sonatas (G13, also in A), we can be pretty sure that it is genuine. Besides, it has much in common with his other concertos, including its companion on this album: the same delicate refinement of orchestration (although the tuttis here include two optional horns), similar cantabile writing for the cello, and the instantly recognizable, understated humour that is so much part of Boccherini’s musical personality. If this early work does not quite display the perfect mastery of the other works on this recording, it is certainly worth hearing, its many beauties easily outweighing any trifling imperfections.

Recording details: December 2023
St Silas the Martyr, Kentish Town, London, United Kingdom
Produced by Jonathan Allen
Engineered by David Hinitt
Release date: November 2024
Total duration: 13 minutes 28 seconds

Cover artwork: The Family of the Infante Don Luis de Borbon (1783/4, detail, believed to depict Boccherini) by Francisco de Goya (1746-1828)
Fondazione Magnani-Rocca, Parma / Bridgeman Images

Cello Concerto in A major 'The Frog', G475

Steven Isserlis (cello), Orchestra of the Age of Enlightenment

Reviews

Introduction