Pisendel. Neue Sonaten
New sonatas for violin and continuo
Johann Georg Pisendel was one of those artists who undoubtedly marked the European music scene of the first half of the eighteenth century. He was a reference for performers and composers of his time and his legacy continues to surprise us and discover fundamental and unknown aspects of the Baroque musical world. Yet, Pisendel is still a great unknown.
He was a student of Torelli, Montanari, Heinichen or Vivaldi, with whom he also cultivated a deep friendship. Friends of his were also Bach, Telemann, Graupner, Zelenka, Hasse or Graupner. From among this wonderful list of friends we know that Bach wrote especially for him and that Vivaldi, Telemann or Albinoni dedicated sonatas and concerts to him. As teacher, Pisendel had among his students musicians like Quantz, Benda or Agricola. In addition, Pisendel was a talented composer, one of the greatest virtuosos of the eighteenth century and an avid collector and painstaking copyist who managed to gather in his archive for the orchestra of Dresden over two thousand scores, making his collection, known as Schrank II collection, one of the most important musical archives of the first half of the eighteenth century.
The discovery, recording and editing of these sonatas represents a major addition to the musical repertoire of the 18th century as well as the rediscovery of one of the greatest virtuosos of the first half of the 18th century.
The Sound
The recordings on this CD were made with a proprietary microphone technique, called ECA, that was developed by our sound engineer in order to achieve maximum sound fidelity, with very good positioning of the instruments in the virtual space that is being created between your speakers. The mixing and mastering process has been performed with an almost fully analog equipment chain in order to maintain the complex tonal character of the sound of gut strings and the harpsichord. This results in a musical vividness and three-dimensional sound that is rarely heard in acoustic music recordings.