The genius of Georg Philipp Telemann is so overwhelming in its prolificacy that one is tempted not to bother with him -- where does one start? Nevertheless, new recordings of Telemann, many in pieces never before heard, are coming out at such a rate that the listener cannot be blamed for thinking that the composer might still be alive somewhere, cranking out manuscripts. In the field of orchestral suites alone, Telemann once stated he had produced over 600 works, and this unthinkable total, at least in Telemann's case, is probably not an exaggeration. No matter what the prodigious statistics may tell us about Telemann, no one would bother with his music if it wasn't good, and in a surprisingly high number of instances, it's great. Georg Philipp Telemann: Sinfonia melodica by the
Berliner Barock Solisten under
Rainer Kussmaul assembles an appealing combination of unfamiliar orchestral pieces, including two reconstructions of fragmentary works recorded here for the first time.
While the title work, the Sinfonia melodica, does not date from earlier than 1763, the remaining music dates mostly from Telemann's period in Hamburg, 1712 to 1721. These are lively, rhythmically engaging pieces that, like in the case of
J.S. Bach and
Handel, stand up well to performance on modern instruments, which is what the
Berliner Barock Solisten utilizes. Nevertheless, they retain the basic principles of Baroque performance style; allegro movements are fast and zippy and adagio movements are played slowly, with sensitivity, but do not droop or plod. To the
Berliner Barock Solisten, "authenticity" is more about fashion and pacing, rather than the instruments employed. Highlights include the impressively difficult violin passages in the fragmentary Violin Concerto in E major, TWV 51:E3 and the iconoclastic opening movement of the Oboe Concerto in D minor TWV 51:d2, which proves that Telemann was not above applying quirky and unconventional solutions in order to vary normally routine harmonic transitions. Deutsche Grammophon's recording is excellent and palpably realistic.