boccherini cello concerto in b flat major

Boccherini didn’t leave his second cellist out, either, with Posner also enjoying a rich solo rising to the heights. Soon the texture thinned to three for an extended cello solo, Isserlis’ wonderful tone rising to a high trill with graceful elegance. The second movement Andante gave first violinist Jonian Ilias Kadesha greater prominence, the other four instruments accompanying at walking pace.

With a relatively congested texture there was nonetheless a beautiful combination of melodies, though the development clouded over in outlook a little. A rich D minor setting found Tim Posner’s cello initially leading with a sonorous tune, before a genial second section in F major assigned plenty of melodic interest to each of the five players. We heard the String Quintet in D minor Op.13/4 from 1772, from early in the Madrid vocation – but clearly Boccherini was already at home in the two-cello idiom. Unfortunately that appeal has not regularly transferred to the concert hall, at least not in the UK – but on this evidence, where Boccherini’s music brightened a spring lunchtime, they should be available on the NHS! His works may be functional in origin but they show fresh invention, distinctive colours and generous melodic appeal.

While Mozart would go on to write for a string quintet with two violas in the late 1780s, Boccherini achieved a very different balance. A prodigious cellist, he joined the string quartet in the court of Don Luis in Madrid and wrote himself into the musical equation, making an unusually weighted quintet with two cellos, a combination that became his calling card with over 100 works. One of his very first recordings, made for Virgin Classics, brought together a selection of the prolific composer’s works for cello, two of which were heard in this Wigmore Hall lunchtime concert.īoccherini was born in Italy in 1743, but made his name and much of his living in Spain, where he lived from 1768 until his death. Steven Isserlis has been a passionate advocate of the music of Luigi Boccherini for a number of years.

Boccherini cello concerto in b flat major