The extraordinary versatility and sheer commercial productiveness of Joseph Bodin de Boismortier (over 100 opus numbers published between 1724 and 1747) was the cause of some amusement amongst his contemporaries, and there is still suspicion of him today, when so many of his instrumental sonatas turn up among the graded teaching material. Yet he was a competent composer, and as the French writer La Borde put it a decade or two after his death, “anyone who desires to take the trouble to excavate this abandoned mine will find enough grains of gold dust there to make an ingot”.
I doubt whether Badinage have dug up all of Boismortier’s music yet, though I would not want to bet against them being able to play most of it, especially given Paul Carroll’s impressive versatility on wind instruments. Here he fearlessly tackles flute, oboe and bassoon (and he can play recorder as well) with creditable dexterity, though it has to be said not with the true refinement of those instruments’ own best exponents. It is nice to hear him tripping confidently through fast passages, often with some aplomb, but more subtlety in phrasing and in the shaping of individual notes would be welcome, and the Oboe Sonata is not an entirely happy experience from the point of view of intonation. The other players, too, could make more imaginative contributions to the continuo sonatas for oboe and bassoon: surely the art of improvised keyboard accompaniment has moved on from the dull chords we are offered here. David Rowland is pleasing enough, however, in what seems to be the most interesting music on the disc, the sonatas for flute and harpsichord and a short suite for solo harpsichord. This is an enterprising release, but in the end I don’t know that I could say to whom it ought to appeal.'