Boccherini, L :: Concerto in D Major, op. 27

Concerto in D Major, op. 27

Boccherini, L

International Music Company presents Boccherini's 'Concerto in D Major', op. 27 for flute and piano edited by Jean-Pierre Rampal.

'Luigi Boccherini, in full Luigi Rodolfo Boccherini, (1743-1805), was an Italian composer and cellist who influenced the development of the string quartet as a musical genre and composed the first music for a quintet for strings, as well as a quintet for strings and piano. His approximately 500 works also include sacred music, symphonies, and concerti. Perhaps because his most significant work consists of chamber music and symphonies, Boccherini has often been compared to Haydn, usually to his disadvantage. Like Vivaldi in relation to Bach, Boccherini is found wanting for the very qualities that established his fame as a composer: melodic fecundity, an emphasis on virtuosity (especially with respect to his own instrument, the cello), fairly undemanding forms, and a lack of the kind of thematic development that had become a hallmark of German music. Thus, whereas Haydn s first movements usually centre upon the closely reasoned argument of their development sections, Boccherini s depend on their thematic material and the way in which it is presented and re-presented. Yet his treatment of instrumental texture was richly varied, emerging as one of the most characteristic features of his music, particularly in his concertante writing, in which he obtained a wide variety of tone colours by writing high viola or cello parts (he was clearly influenced here by his own instrumental facility). His overriding concern was the production of smooth, elegant music; thus, his favourite expression marks were soave (soft), con grazia (with grace), and dolcissimo (very sweetly). It is in his gentle warmth and superlative elegance often with a hint of melancholy just below the surface that Boccherini s most characteristic contribution may be found.'

- Adam Augustyn