Recorder Sonatas CD16

Abstract

The measured tread and hypnotically steady theme of the opening Larghetto-Adagio announce this as a sober sonata, indeed, but not one that exploits its minor key for pathos. Upon each iteration, the recorder's melody becomes a bit more ornate, so the movement is not as austere as it initially seems. The Andante picks up the pace, but the somewhat monotonous recorder theme pales next to the continuo part, which interjects a little burbling figure every couple of bars through much of the movement. (The melody appears in different form in the solo "Vouchsafe, o Lord" in Handel's Te Deum in A.) This is followed by an extremely compact Adagio; the recorder strives upward in a short sequence of gestures, but gives up in less than a minute and enters a more horizontal race with the continuo in the final Presto. Of the 15 or so sonatas for solo instrument and basso continuo composed by George Frideric Handel that have at various times and in various combinations been lumped together under the title Opus 1, a full third were originally composed with the recorder—really, along with the violin, the most common and popular instrument around the turn of the eighteenth century—in mind; in fact, only the violin is more fully represented in the Opus 1 collection. However, each of the five sonatas for recorder and basso continuo from Opus 1—including the Flute Sonata in B minor, Op. 1, No. 9, that originally saw life as a Recorder Sonata in D minor—is undoubtedly the product of Handel's pen, whereas a handful of the violin sonatas may well be spurious. They are all splendid examples of Handel's youthful craftsmanship, very likely composed before the composer moved to England in 1710 and at any rate not after 1720, and showing how well able the 20-some year old composer was to adapt the phenomenally popular Corelli sonata style to suit his own personal musical language.

The opening Larghetto of the Recorder Sonata in G minor, Op. 1, No. 2 (HWV 360), starts out in much the same manner as the prototypical Corelli sonata da chiesa (literally, "church sonata," with the classic four-movement slow-fast/slow-fast movement organization): a steadily unfolding bass line in eighth notes provides support for a melody of great rhythmic flexibility. Though marked Andante, the second movement is filled with fiery descending figures in the bass and excited written-out ornaments in the recorder. The recitativo-like Adagio is, by comparison, quite short, roving about chromatically until it moves cadentially into the final, quicksilver Presto. Here, note the repeated duplet figures, a device Handel was particularly keen about and which figures into the violin sonatas on many occasions.

The Sonata in A minor, Op. 1, No. 4 (HWV 362), is one of the relatively few Opus 1 pieces that exists in just one version. Again, Handel uses a four-movement blueprint. Rolling dotted figures provide a gentle backdrop for the opening Larghetto, while the following Allegro is built around repeated broken chord figures in the bass and a heroic recorder line. Here, the Adagio, in F major, is a real movement unto itself rather than a glorified, much-expanded half-cadence. Somewhat unusually, the recorder does not join the continuo in the third movement until a full phrase has already gone by.

With Op. 1, No. 7, a Sonata in C major for recorder and continuo (HWV 365) that is one of the finest Opus 1 works, Handel moves away from the strict sonata da chiesa form to explore the possibilities of a five-movement sonata da camera. While only the fourth movement—A tempo di Gavotta—is explicitly dance-related, a leisurely attitude fills the whole work, and we can surely hear dance, even if only in the abstract, in the buoyant triple meter of the two Allegro movements (movements two and five).

As mentioned, the Sonata in B minor, Op. 1, No. 9, for flute seems to be a later version of the Sonata in D minor (HWV 367a) for recorder; the work is in seven movements, the last of which is a delightful tempo di menuet.

Opus 1, No. 11 in F major (HWV 369) is the second of two major-mode recorder sonatas from the collection. Here Handel inserts, as the fourth movement, a sicilienne into the devout sonata da chiesa vessel.

Besides these five pieces, Handel also composed a Recorder Sonata in B flat major (HWV 377) that is one of just a handful of three-movement sonatas found in his output.