Happy Hours are here again!
Giordano Bruno | Wherever I am, I am. | 02/05/2008
(5 out of 5 stars)
"I ordered this CD in Europe, and it has followed me all the way to Minnesota. I can hardly tell you how glad I am that it survived the trip!
Han-Joerg Mammel is a fine robust Tenorlied singer, with excellent pitch and dynamics control, but he's not really the raison d'etre for this performance. La Fenice, the instrumental ensemble, totally steals the show. Jean Tubery, the leader of La Fenice, is one of three god-like cornettists in the modern world, the other two being Bruce Dickey and Doron Sherwin of Concerto Palatino. Tubery's cornetto sounds remarkably different from Dickey's and Sherwin's - softer, freer, more vocal, more French if you will, but equally virtuosic. I stand in awe of all three.
Buxtehude's fame as an organist has disposed many listeners to imagine him as a sturdy Protestant, skillful but too earnest for "happy hours".
(O froeliche Stunden = Oh happy hours). The Leider and canzone on this CD, with their lush, almost lascivious instrumental counterpoint, should dispel that impression forever.
Tubery is to the cornetto as Fabio Biondi is to the violin. How's that for an inducement? Now if we could arrange a concert with the two of them facing off across the stage..."