In his debut solo recording, lutenist Christopher Wilke presents a selection of four solo sonatas and a divertimento for the lute from the second half of the eighteenth century. Most of the compositions selected are manuscript lute intabulations of works for keyboard or other instruments from the period c1750–c1770, a welcome choice as similar recordings often focus on original solo music by renowned lutenists instead of lesser-known arrangements. The selection of works revolves around the idea of the fading art of practising the lute, as encapsulated in the subtitle of the recording: ‘The Last Lute Sonatas’. While the narrative of demise is certainly alluring, it is also misleading, in part because most of these works were conceived for a different medium and thus reflect technical concerns distant from the lute. More importantly, other lute-type instruments such as the gallichon/mandora are known to have remained popular in German-speaking regions well into the late eighteenth and early nineteenth centuries, significantly longer than the D minor lute. Stylistically, the compositions in Graceful Degradation lie somewhere within a spectrum defined by the intimate and expressive empfindsam style at one end, and the graceful galanterie that gained prominence after the middle of the century at the other.
Six of Hasse's sonatas for the harpsichord also survive as suonate accomodate per il liuto, a small number when compared to the more than fifty opera arias by the same composer arranged for solo lute. The Sonata in E flat major is similar in its characteristics to the better-known set of four sonatas written for Maria Josepha, the Royal Dauphine of France, sonatas which also happen to survive in lute intabulations. A repeating bass-note motive drives the first movement, characterised by sharp, dramatic contrasts of register and dense passages in the lower registers typical of keyboard writing. The slow movement, with its simple texture and lyrical melody, is decidedly operatic, and is followed by a sprightly final movement.
Paulo Carlo Durant's Sonata in A minor is one of only a handful of compositions by the lutenist known today, and almost certainly originates from his tenure at the Bayreuth court (c1757–1769), where he replaced Adam Falckenhagen (died 1754) as Kammerlautenist. Until recently, little was known about Durant's life. Research by Peter Király has established that Durant was the son of tenor and lutenist Anton Aloys Durant (Turant?), court musician for the Esterházys (1709–1721) and church musician at St Martin of Pressburg (nowadays Bratislava, Slovakia) (Peter Király, ‘Quellenangaben zu Paul Charl(es) Durants möglicher Abstammung’, Die Laute 7 (2007), 439–448). Paul Karl was baptized on 28 June 1712 in Pressburg, and later employed as a boy singer at the same church. He resurfaces as a lutenist in Mannheim in 1736–1746, in Frankfurt in 1747 and finally in Bayreuth. His trail again disappears in 1769, when the court moved to Ansbach. Only the first two movements of the sonata, Fantasie and Fuga, are included, enough to underscore Durant's skill as a composer and to remind the listener that he is the only lutenist among all the composers featured in this recording.
The source of the charming five-movement Divertimento attributed to Haydn in this recording is one of the main eighteenth-century manuscript collections of chamber music for lute in combination with other instruments. The Augsburg Lute Tablature (D-As Tonkunst 2° Fasz. III) is a fascinating collection of fifty-six fascicles that contain repertoire from the Bayreuth court during the time of Wilhelmine of Prussia, Margravine of Brandenburg-Bayreuth. Wilhelmine was herself a respected lutenist and composer, and was responsible for the continuous presence of renowned lutenists in her court, including figures such as Falckenhagen, Johann Pfeiffer, Bernard Joachim Hagen (employed as a violinist) and Durant. Musicologist Tim Crawford had suggested Haydn as one of several possible composers, based on similarities with Haydn's early style and the placement of the work in the manuscript, where it follows a solo lute version of the composer's Cassatio in G major, hII:1, also unattributed in the manuscript (Tim Crawford, ‘Haydn's Music for the Lute’, in Le luth et sa musique II, ed. Jean-Michel Vaccaro (Paris: Centre National de la Recherche Scientifique, 1980), 69–86). This Divertimento, however, is not a composition by Haydn, but an arrangement of Jakob Friedrich Kleinknecht's Divertimento per il cembalo obligato e violino overo’ flauto, the sole copy of which survives in manuscript in Nuremberg (D-Ngm Mus. Hr 155, 2). Given that the lute solo is an exact intabulation of the keyboard part, an additional treble part is almost certainly missing from the version found in the Augsburg Lute Tablature. Its status as an incomplete arrangement is supported by the overall contents of the source manuscript, as several of the concertos and chamber music compositions for lute and other instruments are missing at least one of the additional instrumental parts.
The source manuscript for the anonymous Sonata in D minor, the Rosani Lute Book (D-LEm III.11.64), is similar in scope to the Ausgburg compilation, albeit smaller in scale and dominated by solo and (incomplete) chamber works with lute by Johann Kropfgans. This anonymous ‘Sonata 2a’ was clearly written by a lutenist, perhaps an accomplished amateur, judging by the citation of a Sylvius Leopold Weiss sonata in the opening Fantasia and the premeditated harmonic scheme that recurs in all subsequent movements. Stylistically, the sonata resembles Kropfgans's style in its light, elegant and galant pleasantness.
Flautist and violinist Jakob Friedrich Kleinknecht was also closely associated with the Bayreuth court. A member of the Hofkapelle from 1743, Jakob Friedrich eventually became court composer (1763) and music director of the Hofkapelle (1764). The source composition for the Sonata in B flat major has yet to be identified (Kleinknecht is not known to have been a lutenist), and is one of only seven compositions of his arranged for lute, all of which survive in the Augsburg Lute Tablature. The sonata is characteristic of the composer's early Bayreuth works, strongly influenced by the empfindsam style, which contrast with the Divertimento, more galant in its melodic clarity and expression.
Wilke's competent performance shows a preference for a flexible, at times rhapsodic interpretation of tempo and rhythm. This approach serves some movements better than others. For instance, in the opening Fantasia of the Sonata in D minor (Rosani Lute Book), such tempo flexibility strengthens the dramatic effect of the arpeggio pattern, enhancing its expressive characteristics. The same can be said for the first and third movements of the Kleinknecht sonata. In other instances the effect is quite the contrary. In the opening movement from the Hasse sonata, for example, short phrase repetitions indicated in the manuscript as alternating forte and piano are slowed down for the latter dynamic, resulting in a loss of the rhythmic drive set up by the initial repeated bass-note pattern (which the performer emphasizes by adding an initial bar of the repeating E♭). A similar situation occurs in the second movement of the Kleinknecht sonata, where the character of the piece resembles more a fantasia than the Andante, ma gratiosamente that is indicated. There is also a tendency to bring out melodic lines by separating treble and bass notes indicated as simultaneous, an approach that is reminiscent of twentieth-century classical guitar technique, which emphasizes the treble but often has the adverse effect of obscuring the motion of the bass line. Tasteful cadenzas are added in the Moderato from the Hasse sonata (with the three final bars repeated as a petite reprise), in the Fuga from the Durant, in the Divertimento's Finale and in the middle movement of the Kleinknecht sonata. Overall, the performances are effective in transmitting the sense of fancy found in the different compositions.
The brief booklet notes, written by Wilke, touch lightly on several issues key to mid-eighteenth-century lute style – the attempts by composers for the lute to embrace the empfindsam style, the inevitable stylistic changes that forced the instrument out of favour – though I am unsure what the author means when he refers to a ‘fairly unified style of the baroque’. I found myself wishing that more ground were covered in the notes, and in more detail, given the uniting subject proposed for the album.
