This is a recital of harpsichord music chosen to suit a particular instrument: an exceptionally beautiful Shudi and Broadwood of c. 1775 now in the possession of the recitalist Gerald Gifford. Handel and Haydn were both known to have owned instruments like this one, and to their music Gifford has added works by other keyboard composers, including the Italians Pasquali and Paradis and the Scotsman Thomas Erskine, Sixth Earl of Kelly, who flourished during the Georgian era.
The keyboard transcription of Handel's Overture to Tolomeo makes a grand opening gesture as we accustom ourselves to the lovely sweetness of the instrument. The repeats in the dances of Thomas Chilcot's Suite No. 3 in B flat provide Gifford with ample opportunity to show off the many colours of the instrument (note especially the Corente). In the series of works leading up to the music of Arne, J. C. Bach and Haydn are lighter in weight, they have been sensitively caught by Gifford: in particular, the nicely sprung dance rhythms of the Chilcot and Earl of Kelly, the languid delicacy of the Pasquali, the elusive little chromatic forays into distant harmonies in the Chilcot Allemanda and the unexpected shift to minor mode near the beginning of the Paradis Vivace.
The Arne Sonata in F is, of course, quite well known; Gifford executes the dotted rhythms of the Andante quite sharply, which focuses on the individual beats and slightly inhibits the flow of the musical line. He does articulate the beautifully balanced phrases of the Arne Allegro and the J. C. Bach B flat Allegretto, whose transparent texture is enchanting on this instrument. The outer movements of Haydn's Sonata in C are all vitality and virtuosity, while the Menuetto and Trio are for connoisseurs. Gifford plays all of these works with a finely controlled technique, immaculate ornamentation and a breadth of expression tailored to the era and the instrument.'