The success of several recent recordings of Heinrich Biber's Mystery Sonatas seems to have spurred the issue or reissue of other works by this wild man of the late seventeenth century German Baroque. The splendidly ambitiously titled Harmonia Artificiosa-Ariosa, a set of partitas for the trio-sonata ensemble of two solo instruments plus continuo, is especially closely related to the Mystery Sonatas, for Biber again made use here of the scordatura or retuning technique. Biber was writing for a small ensemble in these pieces, and not for the intrinsically extreme solo violin, but the music has a full complement of the flashy, moody quality prized by Biber's fans. That group included the great English critic Charles Burney, who a century after Biber's period of activity called him the top virtuoso of his time.
The lead creative force on this two-disc set is
Reinhard Goebel, the director of the
Musica Antiqua Köln. There's no doubt that Biber poses a tough interpretive challenge for players; his music seems to demand a certain amount of excess, and the crisp, steady, straight-over-the-plate quality that works so well for Vivaldi and Handel won't do the job in his case.
Goebel's reading is sculpted like a block of ice at a winter carnival -- it is vigorous, muscular, glittering, and, well, a little chilly. The steely fast movements of Biber's suites of dances are exciting indeed on this recording. They grab the listener as few other recent Baroque recordings have, and they apparently seized the attention of U.S. Grammy Award nominators, who gave this disc a nod for Best Small Ensemble Performance of 2004.
Goebel writes in his notes that he "brooded on these partitas for thirty long years," and that overthinking shows in a few places as well. You might look for an older performance of these sonatas by
Andrew Manze on Harmonia Mundi if you can find it. But if not, Baroque enthusiasts and violinists shouldn't miss the chance to hear this music. Archiv's sound environment matches what
Goebel is trying to do unusually nicely.