Albinoni: Oboe Concertos, Vol. 2

Tomaso Giovanni Albinoni explores the warmth of the Oboe in this collection of Concerti. This CD is one of a series of three CDs which fully demonstrate Albinoni's skill and balance in contrasting the woody warm sounds of the oboe with the more stringent sounds of the string instruments. It is interesting that the oboe was perfected as an instrument in France in the 1650s and thus Albinoni's compositions of the 1690s are some of the first concerti written for this instrument. The notes that come with the CD point out that the instrument gained popularity in Venice and was first used in the opera in 1692 and then heard in St. Marco in 1696. Also, since the musicians of Venice played a pioneering role in the development of the concerto form and thus it was predictable that concerti for oboes would be developed. Vivaldi did compose concerti for oboe but Michael Talbot's essay indicates that he saw the oboe as a replacement for the violin in the concerti. This is in contrast to Tomaso Albinoni who found an alternative interpretation of the oboe in the concerti, that of evoking the human voice with the oboe. Albinoni was a singing teacher, married to an operatic diva, and a writer of operas, and thus approached the instrument with a different strategy than that of Vivaldi. Michael Taylor makes the point, which is so fully realized in this CD, that whereas Vivaldi would have th oboe double the first violin in opening passages of the concerto but Albinoni allows the oboe to hold back until the solo or until an entirely different line is established. You will hear this over and over in this masterful CD. Taylor also points out that Albinoni would present the opening solo twice, the first time truncated so that the concerto returns to the opening solo later and completes the passage. Taylor points out that this strategy is taken from the operatic aria of the time. from C. B Collins Jr. @amazon.com