Luogo e data di registrazione		Palais Schönburg, Vienna (Austria) - 4-7 febbraio 1975
	Registrazione: live / studio		studio
	Production		Dr. Andreas Holschneider
	Recording supervision		Franz-Christian Wulff
	Recording Engineer		Klaus Scheibe
	Prima Edizione LP		ARCHIV - 2533 303 - (1 LP - durata 47' 04") - (p) 1975 - Analogico
	Prima Edizione CD		ARCHIV - 439 964-2 - (4 CD's - durata 71' 35"; 70' 09"; 70' 42" & 72' 56" - [CD3 1-25]) - (c) 1992 - ADD
	Cover		Jean-Honoré Fragonard "Danseuse" (Tänzerin · A Dancer) - Photo: Three Lions, New York
	Note		-

 

Rococo Dance Music Rococo (from the French rocaille) is a term used for the style characteristic of the arts as cultivated during the second half of the 18th century - a more graceful, and delicately ornate offspring of the Baroque, which accompanied the last glories ofthe Ancien Regime. Thus the rococo age was that of Louis XV and XVI in France, and in Germany and Austria that of Frederick the Great and the Empress Maria Theresa. The rococo attitude to life was mirrored in the elegant and superficial graces of courtiers, and in the “back to nature” movement initiated by Rousseau but never taken very seriously, leading as it did to little more than highly artificial pastoral entertainments and picnics. In Germany, however, this was also the Age of Enlightenment, which brought about the first major steps toward a genuinely natural way of life and view of the world. All this was reflected both in literature and in music. In the realm of music it is not easy to highlight the rococo style as distinct from that of the late Baroque and early Classical periods. Dance music of this era almost automatically is at home in courtly surroundings, and it is closely connected with the stage, with stage dancing and ballet. The dances chosen for this recording are from three great centres of rococo art: the France of Louis XV the Vienna of the Empress Maria Theresa, and Germany, where musical life flourished both in the princely residences and in Free and Imperial cities. Jean-Philippe Rameau lived in Paris from 1722 until his death. He was a major composer of operas and ballets, which were produced under the patronage of the wealthy tax collector A.J. Le Riche de La Pouplinière. Dances figure prominently not only in Rameau’s opera-ballets, but also in his other stage works. This is the case in the tragédie lyrique Zoroastre, which was first performed on 5 December 1749 and was revived in a new version in January 1756. The score of this work, in its original version, was published in Paris around 1750. The dance forms used in it are those of dances popular in society at that time. The Viennese composer Josef Starzer wrote much ballet music. Trained as a violinist, singer and composer, he joined the orchestra of the French Theatre at Vienna in 1752, and there he was appointed by Count Durazzo, the Imperial Theatre Director and patron of Gluck, as “Compositeur des Airs pour les ballets”. The musical historian Dr. Burney praised him as a violinist, writing that he “executes Adagios with uncommon inwardness and feeling”, Starzer won fame through his collaboration with the ballet dancer and choreographer Noverre, an association which gave rise to numerous works including those from which the dances in this recording are taken: Diane et Endimione, 1771/72, Roger et Bradamante, 1771, and Gli Orazi e gli Curiazi, 1774. Carl Philipp Emanuel Bach was the second surviving son of Johann Sebastian Bach. From 1738 onwards he was active as one of Frederick the Great’s chamber musicians, and was appointed harpsichordist at the Berlin court in 1741, following Frederick’s accession to the throne. He was not, however, altogether happy in the service of the king, whose musical taste was exclusively French, and several times he applied for other posts, until in 1767 he succeeded his god-father Telemann as municipal musical director in Hamburg, in which capacity he was responsible for the musical performances at the five principal churches in Hamburg, He died there in 1788. The Polonaises and Minuets included here were probably composed for a splendid ball; as they cannot be dated it is not known whether they were written for the Berlin court or for Hamburg. Possibly it was the example of Telemann, in whose works Polish elements feature prominently, or perhaps the links between the Prussian court and Eastern Europe, which led to the composition of these Polonaises as music for a society function. We are deeply grateful to the directors of the musical institutions who have made the necessary material available to us, and especially to the custodian of the musical collection at the Austrian National Library, Hofrat Dr. Grasberger, in whose premises we were allowed to play Starzer’s dances from the original manuscripts, to select the most valuable among them. In this recording we placed great importance on using only original instruments, including wind instruments. Some particularly attractive touches of original instrumentation are worth mentioning, e.g. the use of English horns, with pizzicato strings, in Starzer’s Gavotte in B flat, and the clarinet parts which C.P. E. Bach still wrote entirely in the style of the “clarino”. Very typical of this composer, even in these little pieces, is the instrumentation with high and expressive flutes, quite different from the gentle doubling of the flutes in Starzer’s Minuets, which points to the influence of johann Christian Bach. Especially interesting is Starzer’s slow movement with solo oboe and viola - a true pas de deux even in the choice of solo instruments. Rameau’s scoring is also full of surprises, such as the solo horn in the Loure. We have been able to try out all these dances in conjunction with dancers who, under the direction of my colleague at the Vienna Musikhochschule Eva Campianu, have specialized in historical dance steps. This gave us valuable assistance in choosing the tempi. Eduard Melkus (Translation: John Coombs)