Dorothee Oberlinger / Ensemble 1700 G.F. HANDEL Sonatas for the Recorder

For its authentic instrumental timbres, exquisite period interpretations, superbly engineered sound, and, above all, the sheer genius of the music, this album of Handel's recorder trios and sonatas is guaranteed to please connoisseurs of Baroque chamber music, and should catapult Dorothee Oberlinger and her handpicked Ensemble 1700 into international celebrity. A debut release for these exceptional musicians, this remarkable CD reveals both their scrupulous scholarship and enthusiastic participation, and the combination is winning. Oberlinger plays the recorder with a lucid but modest tone, never upstaging the other players but creating an impression of domestic intimacy that surely attended amateur performances in the eighteenth century. Yet these are not fragile or rarefied renditions, for Oberlinger and her companions are quite vigorous in the Allegro movements; the long, lyrical lines in the Larghettos and Adagios are always solidly supported through the soloist's unerring ornamentation; and the accompaniment is fully realized and strongly characterized, distributed throughout the works to a variety of basso continuo instruments. The illustrated booklet includes an informative essay on the recorder's history and Handel's music by Gerhard Braun, and the recording is absolutely clear in details and natural in reproduction. This disc is highly recommended. (Blair Sanderson)