Understandably, the distinguished eighteenth-century theorist Marpurg expressed admiration for Leclair’s sonatas for two violins (without bass), though in declaring them artistically the equal of Bach’s two-part Inventions he probably gave a misleading impression. For stylistically this is elegantly expressive, vital but suave, very French music. The absence of a bass-line creates no sense of loss, in view of Leclair’s textural skill, which owes much to his extensive use of double-stopping (a technique which he may have been the first French composer to employ) – in the first movement of the present D major Sonata both violins are scored throughout in this manner. If these works were indeed written for amateurs they must have been remarkably accomplished!
The “simplicity of performance” claimed for the two trios on this disc is likewise very relative, and there is nothing remotely didactic about these delectable works. Each begins with an Ouverture – that for Op. 14 beginning with constantly interrupted declamatory gestures and proceeding to a faster section combining a fugato with free concertante writing, but with no return to a slower section at the end – and closes with a Chaconne, the Op. 14 one with vigorous passagework for all, that in the Recreation very fine. Between come various dances, in the latter case including a bouncy Forlane, intriguing Passepieds and an affecting Sarabande. I could have done with a less reticent harpsichord in the Op. 14 Trio, and in the duo sonata Simon Standage often seems on the point of letting its Allegro increase in speed, but otherwise the playing of Collegium Musicum 90 is a sheer delight – clean, rhythmically buoyant, lightly dancing, and fully living up to the direction gracieusement where marked. Why, I wonder, has this attractive disc taken more than two years to emerge?'