Vivaldi: Concerti With Bassoon 2

"Frans Berkhout is an outstanding virtuoso ... and surmounts any apparent difficulties, and is able to make the music sing without any of the antics of another well-known bassoonist of the age. Flautist Georgia Browne is the perfect duetting partner ... A thoroughly enjoyable disc that I happily recommend." --Brian Clark in Early Music Review, October 2011

Antonio Vivaldi is by far the most prolific composer of concertos in musical history; around 475 of his concertos have survived. As a celebrated virtuoso violinist, it is not surprising that he composed mainly for violin, either as soloist or in the concertante group. But Vivaldi also demonstrated a keen interest in other melodic instruments of the period, enriching their repertoire with imaginative and virtuosic compositions. His second choice of solo instrument is, surprisingly, the bassoon. His 39 concertos for bassoon with strings and continuo remain somewhat of an enigma. They are the first such works in history, and there is no indication for whom they are written nor why there are so many. It is possible that they were written for a student virtuoso at the Ospedale della Piet�, where Vivaldi served intermittently throughout his career, and one visitor indeed listed the bassoon among the instruments he heard there, but there are no records of a bassoon teacher nor of the purchase of any such instrument. Furthermore, the instrument is conspicuously absent even among those typical Piet� showcases of rare instruments, such as the oratorio Juditha Triumphans of 1716