Customer Reviews

Scarlatti: Sonatas

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I played piano for many years. Consequently I had several opportunities to play the harpsichord as well, with careful instruction from my teacher about the limitations and capabilities of the instrument. Upon rare occasions I was allowed to play some compositions of Scarlatti, although never on the harpsichord; I was dissatisfied with the harpsichord because of my perceptions of its limitations. In retrospect, and in connection with Trevor Pinnock's performance on Archiv 477 6736 (Scarlatti: Sonatas), I see that the limitations were mine rather than the harpsichord's. Pinnock's almost incredible skill and musical perception contribute to the performance on this CD in such a way to make it beyond masterful, and I highly recommend it. It would be a valuable introduction to baroque music for the amateur, or to the harpsichord for the beginning pianist.

The cover art is Acanthes, art by Henri Matisse from very late in his life, cut-outs pasted onto white paper. The Matisse Archives "preserved every scrap of paper" of Matisse's cut-outs, and this made it possible in 2010 to reconstruct his work down to the shortest scissor cuts, work made possible by and at the Fondation Beyeler.

In connection with Scarlatti's work on this disk, the selection on Track 14 (Sonata in B flat major, K.545: Prestissimo) was recently used by Bob James for his recording that he named The Scarlatti Dialogues (CBS MK 44519). It is track 4 there if you are interested in hearing a "modern" performance by an outstanding jazz musician.

I acquired the Scarlatti Sonatas from Amazon.com because of my perception of a major gap in my musical education --- I had only very limited exposure to Baroque music, and that was restricted to Clementi and Vivaldi. I searched Amazon.com for recordings to fill that gap, generally selecting only those with four- and five-star recommendations, and have been quite satisfied with the two dozen I have so far received and played. Albinoni and Locatelli are my favorites, but there are plenty of other composers of equal talent and appeal among the Amazon.com stock. I highly recommend the Scarlatti: Sonatas because of the skill of the performance, the high quality of the recording, and the special talent that Trevor Pinnock has brought to his performance: With his guidance, one does not notice any limitations whatsoever of the harpsichord, and instead finds that it has numerous features that more than compensate for what I had previously thought were inadequacies. This is a disk that may startle you at first, but upon a second hearing it should rise near the top of your favorites of all serious music over the past five centuries.