All three suites are here; in succession, not mixed. This is customary today, and sensibly; for such a succession is not only almost certainly authentic, but the key-grouping makes a good listening order for each of those three suites. And yet there is a larger design for the whole, which makes a long but not impossible listening; for the F major and D major Suites are relatively ceremonial in character, and scored relatively loudly; and the G major relatively gentle more lightly scored. It would thus seem highly desirable to place this G major Suite centrally (as it probably was originally); and timings make that easy on disc. Malcolm chooses otherwise, incomprehensibly, adding to the unfortunate effect by choosing from G major Suite a G minor movement as a most un-final sounding finale to the whole.
This G minor movement, as it happens, is most beautifully played, with the scoring adjusted so as to let light and air in where there can easily be darkness and gloom. The same is true almost throughout the record. One exception is the F major Suite's Air: it seems to be fashionable today to give this a gloomy sound, almost certainly a lightness of touch which is most noticeable in Malcolm's reading. Sometimes a bass pizzicato catches the ear, sometimes a bassoon allowed the tune on his own; and always the deftest of articulation. Decoration, too, is very well managed: unexaggerated, it allows flow to some of the slower tunes without cluttering the score. The same is true of rhythmic problems; again the music flows easily. All this, of course is made possible by the alertness of the playing; in particular, violin solo passages, whether written as such by Handel or interpolated by way of decorated cadenza, come off splendidly. A similar decorated cadenza for harpsichord might do so, too, if it were more audible; but that instrument is kept (oddly!) on a strict leash throughout. In so far as this is a point of balance it is the only conceivable defect in the recorded sound, which is abundantly clear everywhere, and sometimes gives the string-playing a most agreeably sensuous quality.
These many virtues must allow the record a strong recommendation; but there is a rider to add. It is that the lightness of touch and gentleness of style have to be shown at great length in three consecutive suites; there will be those listeners who, seeking contrast, would here and there opt for a stronger, and occasionally, a livelier sound. And of course the unfortunate recorded order of suites does, by closing with the gentlest of all, emphasize this quality perhaps unduly.
If this recorded order is eccentric it is not actually unique: Neville Marriner, too, adopts it on his Philips version of the music listed above. A good record, this is nevertheless not one I would prefer to Malcolm's; but it most certainly has its own virtues. So has Raymond Leppard's disc, also on Philips: lively, well recorded and properly arranged with the suites in the right order. It is also mid-price. But it cannot be discussed even at thumb-nail length without refering again to that turn-ti-tum-ti-tumm F major Aria; for here, alas, is for some extraordinary reason a new definition of gloom.
Alongside this Malcolm seems positively vivacious! Another small point also suggests Malcolm: it is of course written into the Maritime Navigation Acts that no record of the Water Music can be published without an eighteenth-century picture of the Thames on the sleeve; and, to my innocent listener's eyes, this particular competition is easily won by ASV (with a bit of help from Canaletto).'