United Kingdom Florilegium – Father, Son and Godfather: Florilegium / Ashley Solomon (flute/director), with Helen Charlston (mezzo-soprano). Wigmore Hall, London, 11.3.2025. (CC)
Telemann – Ouverture-Suite in A, TWV 55:A1; Cantata, Ihr Volker hört, TWV 1:921.
J. S. Bach – Musikalisches Opfer, BWV 1079: Ricercar a 6
Telemann – Cantata, Ihr Völker hört, TWV 1:921
C. P. E. Bach – Flute Concerto in D minor, H 484/1 / Wq deest
J. S. Bach – Cantata, Vergnügte Ruh, beliebte Seelenlust, BWV 170
Members of Florilegium: Ashley Solomon (flute/director), Magdalena Loth-Hill, Gabriella Jones (violins), Jordan Bowron (viola), Sarah McMahon (cello); Carina Cosgrave (double bass), Alexandra Bellamy (oboe), James Johnstone (harpsichord/chamber organ)
It was good to see Telemann so to the forefront of this programme: his ever-refreshing, perfectly crafted music is so full of joy. And here’s the rub: it suffered not one jot from close proximity to JSB.
The ensemble Florilegium has a grand performance and recording history and enjoys a reputation for excellence that, on the evidence of this concert, is fully deserved. This was one of the most satisfyingly planned Baroque concerts I have attended.
Telemann’s Ouverture-Suites are part of a lineage established by Georg Muffat (whose Florilegium is where the ensemble primarily takes its name) in which the French Overture was imported into the Germanic idea of a Suite. As well as Telemann and Bach, composers such as Graupner and Fasch took up the reins. The performance by Florilegium was superb: not since Itinéraire Baroque back in 2017 (the Telemann year) have I enjoyed a performance of the Master’s works so much. Florilegium’s sound is markedly warm for a period ensemble (the group comprised two violins, one each viola, cello and double bass, plus harpsichord). A vibrant Allegro followed the stately dotted opening of the Ouverture. A ‘Branle’ is a courtly dance for couples, here markedly jaunty. Telemann plays with rhythmic and metric expectations in the ‘Gaillarde’ effectively, and Florilegium’s performance had a real spirit of discovery. As so often, it is the ‘Sarabande’ that held the true emotional core of the work, Magdalena Loth-Hill’s first violin beautiful in its decorations. Telemann places a ‘Réjouissance’ as riposte, another movement that plays with rhythmic expectation (even more pronounced here, arguably). The dance that ends the set is ‘Canarie,’ named after a dance from Spain’s Canary Islands popular from the Renaissance onwards and incorporated into Baroque composers’ bags of tricks. The musical material flitted here and there, as it would, trilling away nicely. What a phenomenal piece, so much more than an opener. A sequence of movements performed with verve and style.
Johann Sebastian next, a complete contrast, the ‘Ricercar a 6’ from the Musical Offering. If Telemann is every inch of the world, this aspect of Bach is beyond it. It was performed on a harpsichord by James Johnstone (who also played chamber organ elsewhere in the concert), a performance of great concentration. Having it on one keyboard instrument emphasises the rigour Bach brings to the work; effective use of harpsichord stops from Johnstone, too.
The Telemann cantata, Ihr Volker hört (You people hear) is an Epiphany cantata from the composer’s complete cycle of cantatas, Harmonischer Gottesdienst. Florilegium has recorded this cantata, with Claire Wilkinson, and that account is indeed lovely. But Helen Charlston is luxury casing, as it were. The text is by Arnold Wilckens and mediates on the contrast between God’s light and its contrast with the night (where, even there, God’s light is transformed into starlight); a God who ‘radiates salvation’. Epiphany (January 6) is a celebration of the Wise Men bearing gifts; they were, of course, guided by a star.
Telemann’s cantata begins with the titular aria, which featured Ashley Solomon as the excellent, and active, flute obbligato. It is of magnificent invention, and Charlston lived every moment, just as she projected the heart of the long recitative which follows (that includes a part for flute, and found Johnstone, appropriately, on chamber organ). One recitative, but various defined sections and emotions: the sudden change of pace at ‘Doch welche Stille!’ (‘But what silence now!’), the more determined stance of ‘Nein, nein! Ich will den Undank nicht’ (‘No, no! I don’t want this ingratitude’), which initiates a passage of appreciation of the light from the ‘Star of Jacob’ (‘Jakobstern’). Charlston was decidedly more attentive to these shifts than Wilkinson on her recording. The final movement (there are only three) was the aria, ‘Hallelujah! I offer praise to your beams of light’, finding both Charlston and Solomon in fine fettle for the long melismas; and how effective it was when Sarah McMahon’s cello joined Solomon’s flute. A supremely elevating way to prepare for the intermission!
It is fair to say that Telemann can act as a bridge between J. S. Bach and C. P. E. Bach’s move towards the Rococo and Classical. Good to have a C. P. E. Bach Flute Concerto next (Ashley Solomon obviously as soloist). Perhaps better known in its later harpsichord version (which has an orchestra that includes two horns), it is a piece which demands significant virtuosity from its soloist. With these smaller forces, the sense of chamber music was palpable, while for the more pronounced tuttis, the players gave in vigour what they could not in heft. The shift from the brightness of Telemann’s depiction of light to the Sturm und Drang of C. P. E.’s D minor was tangible. And Solomon was not only virtuosic; his sound was fabulous, as if glowing. The performance highlighted C. P. E. Bach’s imagination (what some people call his ‘quirks’!): a sudden passage just for flute and low-placed violin certainly made its mark. Dynamic contrasts typical of this composer (‘dynamic terracing’, really) were superbly done. Afte that Allegro, a central Poco Andante adds some shade. A long string opening found Florilegium reveling in the composer’s dissonances; another passage, later, of only the high instruments (flute, two violins, and viola) stood out. No doubting the Sturm und Drang of the finale (Allegro di molto): Solomon’s scales seemed to fly upwards as if flames. The cadenza was most impressive, as was Johnstone’s nice little harpsichord ‘break’ leading back to the main theme on one occasion. Invigorating stuff.
Finally, a JSB Cantata, one of three Bach wrote in 1756 for alto (BWV 35, 169, and 170). Most often performed these days by a countertenor. Vergnügte Ruh, beliebte Seelenlust (‘Delightful rest, beloved pleasure of the soul’) was written for the sixth Sunday after Trinity and has a text by Georg Chrisian Lehms. Alexandra Bellamy provided the glorious depth of sound from an oboe d’amore: this was spellbinding playing, warm in its lower reaches and perfectly controlled. Against this, Helen Charlston spun Bach’s heavenly melody, a heartfelt elevation of the text. The cantata is quite remarkable in its use of chromaticism, injected in the first recitative (in which the World is referred to as a ‘house of sin’ that ‘erupts only in hellish songs’); that sense of pain expressed through dissonance and chromaticism persists in the aria, ‘Wie jammern mich doch die verkehrten Herzen’ (‘How the perverted hearts afflict me’), with single organ line against unison low strings. It almost feels, initially, like the slow movement of an organ concerto; but for Charlston’s blanched rendition of the remarkable text. The ending (a unison arrival) seemed inevitable.
The accompanied recitative, ‘Wer sollte sich demanch’ (‘Who should hereafter’) finds Bach creating a halo of strings around his soloist, here a flowering of radiance. and yes, even here, nothing is straightforward: Bach ‘twists’ the harmony like a screw when the text refers to ‘hatred’ and ‘hardship’. The final movement is an aria in the manner of a courtly dance. Solomon, Charlston and Johnstone enlivened this toe-tapping number (I’m sure Bach wouldn’t mind me describing it as such!). It is a plea for Jesus to take the protagonist away to a plateau of peace. Both organ and singer are asked for significant mobility; both Johnstone and Charleson responded with aplomb.
A phenomenal concert, well-nigh faultless. What joy there was here!
Colin Clarke
Addendum: It seems churlish to end a review of a concert that provided so much enrichment on a downer, so I will add an addendum instead. The programme leaflet we were provided with was riddled with errors and omissions. Surely, an instrumentarium is called for when period performance is involved? Work titles were given, but no movement titles, so many in the audience would have no idea how many movements comprised the Telemann Ouverture-Suite, or what the markings were for the C. P. E. Bach concerto. There were TWV numbers, but no BWV number for the Musical Offering. As if to compensate, they printed ‘BWV 170’ twice in the title for the final piece. That could be an error in that one was meant to be ‘No.170,’ but even the intention there would be suspect, as the BWV numbers and sequence numbers for the cantatas are the same, so why repeat?