Trevor Pinnock – Journey (2016) [LINN FLAC 24bit/96kHz]

This unique harpsichord recital by Trevor Pinnock charts two incredible musical journeys four hundred years apart. Inspired by the travels of Antonio Cabezón, the sixteenth century organist and composer, Pinnock’s programme weaves a path not only through Cabezón’s life but also through his own enviable career.

When I chanced upon the story of Antonio de Cabezón travelling through Italy, the Netherlands and Germany to England with Prince Philip of Spain, it caused me to reflect on the way musicians are constantly coming into contact with music from different backgrounds and how music crosses both geographical and temporal boundaries. So I let my mind wander from Cabezón to our English composers and from John Bull, who spent many years in the Netherlands, to Sweelinck; then I thought of the fact that J.S. Bach owned a copy of Frescobaldi’s Fiori musicali and of connections between the great triumvirate of Bach, Handel and Scarlatti. Yet fascinating as those connections are, the resulting recital programme is surely more a reflection of my own discovery of music and of the journey on which I embarked at an early age.
I was about four years old when I ‘escaped’ from our garden and walked up the hill to a house that reverberated with the magical sounds being made by the concert pianist Ronald Smith. Eventually I was discovered, contentedly sitting on the doorstep; after being given a delicious cup of cocoa, I was duly delivered back home. Later escapes led me to more exciting music, but also in the opposite direction, to builders who welcomed me with tea and doughnuts. Up to the music or down to the doughnuts? An almost impossible choice for a boy of any age. But Ronald Smith’s sister, June, took me on as a pupil when I was six. Music-making with her, even if hard work, was always fun: she gave me simple arrangements of Bach, each with a little story (I especially remember the one about Bach’s long trek to Lübeck to meet Buxtehude).
My years with her and as a choirboy at Canterbury Cathedral introduced me to a wealth of music, but perhaps my greatest discovery of early music for keyboard was through the two-volume Schirmer anthology I bought when I was 12 or 13. These pale-yellow volumes were a treasure trove. Of course the editions were far from Urtext, but here I found The Carman’s Whistle, The King’s Hunting Jigg (so called by Schirmer) and music by a whole range of French, Italian and German composers. A few years later I discovered a harpsichord in a local music shop and was immediately intrigued by its sound.
Around that time also, I bought a recording of George Malcolm playing Bach’s ‘Italian’ Concerto and Chromatic Fantasy and Fugue. Subsequently I bought vinyl records of Wanda Landowska, and of Gustav Leonhardt and Rafael Puyana, both of whom I heard in live recitals. I worked on one of Bach’s French Suites with Puyana at Dartington in 1969, and it was he who introduced me to the music of Cabezón. The greatly contrasting playing styles of my heroes fired me to find my own relationship with the harpsichord and its music.
Some listeners may be surprised that I should record such a wide range of music on one instrument. I do so simply because this is essentially a recital rather than a historical demonstration. The harpsichord I have chosen has travelled all over the world with me in the past 40 years. It was made in 1982 by David Jacques Way of Stonington, Connecticut, after a model by the mid-eighteenth-century French builder Henri Hemsch. I fell in love with it at first sight and was able to borrow it for a recital in New York. By the kindness of its owners it eventually found its way into my possession. The harpsichord is tuned in a meantone temperament for the earliest music and in unequal temperaments for the rest of the programme. -Trevor Pinnock © 2016

Tracklist:

Antonio de Cabezón (1510-1566)
1.Diferencias sobre ‘El canto del caballero'[3’10]

William Byrd (1539/40-1623)
2.The Carman’s Whistle BK36[3’58]

Thomas Tallis (c1505-1585)
3.O ye tender babes[2’37]

John Bull (?1562/3-1628)
4.The King’s Hunt[3’25]

Jan Pieterszoon Sweelinck (1562-1621)
5.Mein junges Leben hat ein End'[6’10]

Johann Sebastian Bach (1685-1750)
French Suite No 6 in E major BWV817
6.Prélude[1’31]
7.Allemande[3’28]
8.Courante[1’47]
9.Sarabande[3’22]
10.Gavotte[1’07]
11.Polonaise[1’20]
12.Bourrée[1’41]
13.Menuet[1’32]
14.Gigue[2’39]

Girolamo Frescobaldi (1583-1643)
15.Toccata nona[4’32]

Girolamo Frescobaldi (1583-1643)
16.Balletto primo e secondo (Movement from Toccate d’intavolatura di cimbalo et organo)[5’39]

George Frideric Handel (1685-1759)
17.Chaconne in G major HWV435[6’36]

Domenico Scarlatti (1685-1757)
18.Son fra l’onde in D major Kk490[5’02]
19.Sonata in D major Kk491[4’57]
20.Sonata in D major Kk492[4’17]

Personnel:
Trevor Pinnock, harpsichord

Download:

mqs.link_TrevrPinnckJurney2016LINN2496.part1.rar
mqs.link_TrevrPinnckJurney2016LINN2496.part2.rar