The European Baroque Soloists have so far produced two Telemann discs on the Denon label. The first contains a set of six quartets together with a seventh drawn from the second part of the composer's Musique de Table (1733). The other, under review here, features a Quartet-Suite in B minor, a Chamber Concerto in G major for flute, oboe d'amore and continuo, and six Canonic Sonatas published in 1738 during Telemann's Paris sojourn. Only in the Concerto do the European Baroque Soloists keep strictly to Telemann's specified instrumentation. The Quartet-Suite was scored for flute, violin, viola da gamba and continuo but is played here by flute, oboe and bassoon with violone and harpsichord continuo. The Canonic Sonatas, on the other hand, were written for pairs of like instruments—flute or violin, but are performed on this disc by flute and oboe.
The accomplished playing of Wolfgang Schulz, Hansjorg Schellenberger, Milan Turkovic, Philip Moll and Klaus Stoll is such as to diminish any reservations about appropriate instrumentation. Yet the reservations remain, albeit in the background. Telemann had an acute ear for instrumental sounds and colours and much of his writing for flute, violin and gamba in the B minor Suite is very carefully thought out. With the best will in the world a bassoon cannot begin to express itself in the same terms as a viola da gamba and when two of the three melodic parts are conceived for strings a precious dimension is lost by substituting woodwind.
These are fluent, musical performances, but do not faithfully realize the composer's intentions. For these reasons it is the delightful little Concerto which comes over with the greatest conviction though the recording acoustic is far too resonant for the essentially intimate character of the writing; and the sound in general affords too much prominence to the continuo which booms away in a far from discreet manner.
The canons are played with panache yet with the heart on the sleeve. There is more to these pieces than just a virtuosic exterior, though I should add that they are perhaps a great deal more amusing to perform than to listen to 'en bloc'. In short, a mixed success. Brilliant playing but a somewhat cavalier approach to the music; and at 44 minutes rather short measure.'