Pratum Integrum Orchestra – Georg Philipp Telemann: Complete Orchestral Suites Vol.1 (2008) SACD ISO

The Russian historical-performance group Pratum Integrum has embarked on a complete recording of Georg Philipp Telemann’s orchestral suites, which number more than 100. This debut album includes three of them in a program lasting just over 52 minutes, and though the dimensions of the project are daunting, the initial indications are good. Like Bach’s suites, Telemann’s are collections of French-style dances, some of them formally fixed like sarabandes and courantes, while others give freer play to the imagination. Imagination is Telemann’s strong suit, and the collection of unusually conceived movements keeps these suites lively, and presumably those to come will be the same way. Consider the musical-joke-like “Galimatias en Rondeau” (track 12) from the Suite in E minor, TWV 55:e3, with its comically contrasting strains (a galimatias is a representation of gibberish), or the “Irlandoise” (track 3) from the D minor suite, TWV 55:d2, a kind of Irish jig, or the explicitly programmatic pieces of which Couperin would have been proud. Also intriguing is the movement sequence of the Suite for orchestra in D minor, which ends with a movement marked “Entrée.” You might suspect a copyist’s error if not for the odd middle-of-the-conversation opening of the Overture; perhaps the piece was intended for some kind of special occasion in which the music would end with the “entrée” of an important personage. The Pratum Integrum Orchestra, predominantly young, is promising indeed. It doesn’t yet have the orchestra-of-virtuosi quality of some of its Western European counterparts, but its performances have a briskly enjoyable quality with plenty of percussive rhythmic drive in the continuo. One looks forward to future releases in the series. Notes are in Russian, German, and English; they’re informative and enthusiastic, as is usual for this label, but annotator Anna Bulycheva kills Telemann off too early when she refers to 1737 as “towards the end” of his life; he lived for another 30 years. The sound is not up to the usual audiophile standard of the Caro Mitis label; close-up microphone placement and a steely edge highlight instrument noise that Telemann’s audiences would have found bizarre. ~~AllMusic Review by James Manheim

Tracklist:

Georg Philipp Telemann (1681-1767)
Orchestersuite d-Moll fur Streicher, Basso Continuo, zwei Oboen und Fagott colla parte (TWV 55:d2)
1 Ouverture [6:50]
2 Rondeau [1:31]
3 Irlandoise [1:23]
4 Rejouissance [1:19]
5 Sarabande [2:13]
6 Les Scaramouches [0:51]
7 Menuet [2:49]
8 Entree [1:52]
Orchestersuite e-Moll fur zwei Violinen, zwei Floten, zwei Oboen, Fagott, Streicher und Basso Continuo (TWV 55:e3)
09 Ouverture [6:59]
10 Les Cyclopes [1:45]
11 Menuet [3:14]
12 Galimatias en Rondeau [2:05]
13 Hornpipe [2:10]
Orchestersuite h-Moll fur zwei Violinen, zwei Oboen, zwei Fagotte, Streicher und Basso Continuo (TWV 55:h1)
14 Ouverture [4:09]
15 Courante [1:43]
16 Air en Rondeau [2:08]
17 Menuet [1:03]
18 Chaconne [3:11]
19 Gavotte [2:02]
20 Menuet [2:46]

Personnel:
Pratum Integrum Orchestra
Musicians:
Sergei Filchenko, 1st violin
Marina Katarzhnova, 1st violin
Dmitry Lepekhov, 1st violin
Dmitry Sinkovsky, 2nd violin
Natalia Kossareva, 2nd violin
Ivan Titov, 2nd violin
Juri Vdovitchenko, viola
Sergei Tischenko, viola
Pavel Filchenko, viola (9 –13)
Pavel Serbin, cello
Alexander Gulin, cello
Michael Khokhlov, double bass
Olga Ivusheikova, transverse flute (9 –13)
Marina Volkova, transverse flute (9 –13)
Philipp Nodel, oboe
Svetlana Usacheva, oboe
Peter Bugrimenko, bassoon
Olga Martynova, harpsichord
Artistic Director – Pavel Serbin
Concertmaster – Sergei Filchenko