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BOCCHERINI: Guitar Quintets, Vol. 3

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Luigi Boccherini (1743 - 1805) Guitar Quintets Vol. 3 The Italian cellist and composer Luigi Boccherini was born in Lucca in 1743, the son of a double-bass...

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Luigi Boccherini (1743 - 1805)

Guitar Quintets Vol. 3

The Italian cellist and composer Luigi Boccherini was born in Lucca in 1743, the son of a double-bass player. His family was distinguished not only in music, but boasted poets and dancers among its members. His eider brother Giovan Gastone, born in 1742, was both dancer and poet, the authorof the text of Haydn's Il ritorno di Tobia and the libretti of some earlier stage-works of the Vienna Court Composer, Antonio Salieri. His sister Maria Ester was a dancer and married Onorato Vigano, a distinguished dancer and choreographer. Her son, Salvatore Vigano, who studied composition with Boccherini, occupies a position of considerable importance in the history of ballet.

Boccherini was giving concerts as a cellist by the age of thirteen, and in 1757 went with his father to Vienna, where they were both invited to join the orchestra of the court theatre. Boccherini returned to Italy, but there were further visits to Vienna, before he finally secured a position in his native town. In 1766, however, he set out with his fellow-townsman, the violinist Manfredi, a pupil of Nardini, for Paris, having performed with both violinists and with Cambini in chamber music in Milan the previous year.

In France Boccherini and Manfredi won considerable success, and the former continued his work as a composer, as well as appearing as a cello virtuoso. In 1768 the pair left for Spain, where Boccherini seems to have lived until his death in 1805. In Madrid he was appointed composer and virtuoso de camera to the Infante Don Luis, younger brother of King Charles III. Part of the following period he spent in Madrid and part at the Palace of Las Arenas in the province of Avila, where the Infante retired after an unacceptable marriage. Members of the Font family were employed by Don Luis as a string quartet and renewed their association with Boccherini at the end of the century. After the death of the Infante in 1785 the composer entered the service of the Benavente-Osuna family.

At the same time he was appointed court composer to Friedrich Wilhelm, who in 1787 became King of Prussia, providing the cello-playing king with new compositions on the same kind of exclusive arrangement that he had earlier enjoyed with Don Luis. There is, however, no evidence that Boccherini ever spent any time in Prussia. After the death of Friedrich Wilhelm and the departure of other patrons from Madrid, Boccherini received support from Lucien Bonaparte, French ambassador in Madrid, and remained busy to the end of his life, although visitors reported that he lived in all the appearance of poverty.

Boccherini's style is completely characteristic of the period in which he lived, the period, that is, of Haydn rather than that of Mozart or Beethoven. He enjoyed a reputation for his facility as a composer, leaving some 467 compositions. A great deal of his music is designed to exploit the technical resources of the cello, in concertos, sonatas, and, particularly, in chamber music for various numbers of instruments, including a remarkable series of quintets with two cellos. The twelve quintets for guitar and string quartet, of which eight have survived, are arrangements by the composer of works written for pianoforte quintet in the late 1790s, sometimes drawing on earlier string quintets. La ritirata di Madrid, so called from its last movement set of twelve variations on the theme of that name, was written in 1798, based principally on the Piano Quintet G. 409. The Guitar Quintet in E minor, G. 451, has its origin in a: piano quintet dated 1797 in the composer's autograph catalogue.

By far the best known today of all Boccherini's compositions must be the Minuet of his String Quintet in E major, G. 275, dated 1771 in the composer's catalogue and first published in 1775 as part of a set of six string quintets, scored, as are 118 of the 184 he w rote, for two violins, viola and two cellos. As so often the quintet opens with a gentle Amoroso movement, followed by a more energetic Allegro con spirito, fertile in invention. The Minuet, an embodiment of the rococo that won its present popularity only towards the end of the nineteenth century, is followed by a final rondo.

Zoltan Tokos

The Hungarian guitarist Zoltan Tokos was born in Kolozsvar, where he began his musical studies, continued subsequently at the Budapest Music Academy under Szendrey Karper Laszlo, in Athens and in master classes with John William Sandwith Leo Brouwer. Since 1976 he has been a member of the teaching staff of the Liszt Music Academy in Debrecen. As a performer he has given concerts throughout Europe and his recordings include the Joaquin Rodrigo Concierto de Aranjuez with the Budapest Strings. His guitar transcriptions have been published by Editio Musica Budapest, Schott, Universal and Salabert.

Danubius String Quartet

The Danubius String Quartet has won considerable acclaim since its establishment in 1983. With the violinists Maria Zs. Szabo and Adel Miklos, violist Cecilia Bodolai and cellist Ilona Ribli, and the artistic direction of the distinguished violinist Vilmos Tatrai, the quartet won awards at Trapani, Evian and Graz in the earlier years of its foundation, and has recorded, among other works, the String Quartet No.1 of Remenyi for Hungaroton, the complete String Quartets of Villa- Lobos for Marco Polo and for Naxos the Mozart and Brahms Clarinet Quintets. The Danubius String Quartet has given recitals in Austria, Germany, Yugoslavia, Italy, France and Switzerland and appeared at a number of international festivals.

Disc 1

Guitar Quintet in C major, G. 453, "La Ritirata di Madrid"

(more info)

Composed by: Luigi Boccherini
Zoltan Tokos, guitar
Recording date: 17-21 August 1992
Produced by: Toth, Ibolya

I. Allegro maestoso assai - 11:58
II. Andantino - 3:48
III. Allegretto - 6:51
IV. 12 Variazioni, "La Ritirata di Madrid" - 6:14

Guitar Quintet in E minor, G. 451

(more info)

Composed by: Luigi Boccherini
Zoltan Tokos, guitar
Recording date: 17-21 August 1992
Produced by: Toth, Ibolya

I. Allegro moderato - 7:50
II. Adagio - 3:09
III. Minuetto - 4:11
IV. Allegretto - 5:32

String Quintet in E major, G. 275

(more info)

Composed by: Luigi Boccherini
Gyorgy Eder, cello
Recording date: 17-21 August 1992
Produced by: Toth, Ibolya

I. Amoroso - 3:48
II. Allegro con spirito - 5:21
III. Minuetto - 3:28
IV. Rondo: Andante - 7:02

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Composer(s):
Boccherini, Luigi

Artist(s):
Eder, Gyorgy; Tokos, Zoltan

Label: Naxos Classics
UPC: 730099573122
Item Number: 8550731
Release Date: Dec 27, 1993