Boccherini: Flute Quintets

Luigi Boccherini (Composer), Jean Pierre Rampal (Performer), Bruno Pasquier (Performer), Mathilde Sternat (Performer), Roland Pidoux (Performer), Regis Pasquier (Performer) | Format: Audio CD

Product Details

• Performer: Jean Pierre Rampal, Bruno Pasquier, Mathilde Sternat, Roland Pidoux, Regis Pasquier
• Composer: Luigi Boccherini
• Audio CD (February 18, 1997)
• Number of Discs: 1
• Label: Sony
• ASIN: B0000029SU
• In-Print Editions: MP3 Download
• Average Customer Review: 5.0 out of 5 stars  See all reviews (1 customer review)
• Amazon Best Sellers Rank: #210,365 in Music (See Top 100 in Music)

Customer Reviews

Most Helpful Customer Reviews

2 of 2 people found the following review helpful:

5.0 out of 5 stars great performances, but are these really by Boccherini?, August 9, 2011

By 

Hammer1 "Hammer1" (SC) - See all my reviews

This review is from: Boccherini: Flute Quintets (Audio CD)

From this review from the New Grove's chief editor, Stanley Sadie:

" These quintets come from a set of six in a Madrid manuscript with an attribution to Boccherini: they are not in Boccherini's own catalogue of his works, which doesn't necessarily exclude their authenticity (he noted in it most of his true chamber music, though not the cello sonatas or the keyboard ones); they sound as if they date from the 1780s, and the presence of an obbligato cello part does of course imply at least some link with him. This is claimed as their world premiere recording.
They are very agreeable and on the whole deftly written pieces, but to my mind don't quite have the ring of his style: their formal regularity, their sometimes motivic writing (the first movement of the G major work, for example), and the frequent spells of rather routine invention argue against his authorship, as does the three-movement form (he preferred, oddly, two-movement opere piccole or four-movement opere grande), the absence of minuets (a movement type he patently relished) and the presence of three very schematic variation finales (a type he avoided). The compiler of the Boccherini thematic catalogue thought that they had "formulas and turns of style which are characteristic of him", on reading through the parts, but since he evidently didn't notice that they were for flute, violin, viola and two cellos (as opposed to flute and string quartet) I am inclined to think the reading-through wasn't too rigorous.
By Boccherini or not, they make pleasant listening. They don't demand that special affection for detail or feeling for texture that the most characteristic Boccherini needs, and respond well to these direct, modern performances, neatly phrased, the dialogues gracefully executed. "