Thomas Georgi has taken on the unenviable task of attempting to bring the neglected viola d'amore back into a kind of favor into modern times. Look at what wonders the film Tous les Matins du Monde has wrought for the viola da gamba -- just a generation ago, hardly anyone played one, and by 2007, all sorts of players that have picked it up. However, there is a huge historical repertoire for gamba and only a very small one for viola d'amore; Vivaldi used it in some of his concerti and in instrumental parts belonging to certain vocal works, and it is in this literature that the viola d'amore has found a home.
Georgi has determined that the largest body of chamber sonatas produced for the viola d'amore by any composer belongs to an obscure figure named Attilio Ariosti, a Bolognese composer who worked from 1716 in London. Ariosti was good enough a composer to have had one of his melodies lifted by Handel for the "Pastoral Symphony" in Messiah nearly 15 years after he died, and Ariosti contributed 21 sonatas to the repertoire for the viola d'amore.
Georgi is in the process of recording them all for BIS; Attilio Ariosti: The Stockholm Sonatas II is the second volume.
Georgi has decided to go with the "Stockholm Sonatas" rubric as, although he likely never set foot in Sweden, Ariosti's music did, as it was copied in London by Swedish composer Johan Helmich Roman during a visit there, possibly from Ariosti himself -- the original has since disappeared. They are very beautiful sonatas, played with great care, sensitivity, and energy by
Georgi with Lucas Harris on archlute and Baroque guitar and
Mime Yamahiro-Brinkmann on cello. In a tonal sense the six-stringed viola d'amore stands somewhat between a violin and a viola -- it has a throatier, more seductive tone than a violin and is much brighter than a viola.
Georgi, in his helpful and informative notes, points up unusual features in Ariosti's music, such as unconventional harmonic turns and his use of abrupt silences. While this last feature is heard most distinctly in the Sonata No. 11 in A minor, chances are such fine details are not the things you will notice when you listen the first time. What does catch your attention is the singing quality of the solo instrument -- "d'amore" indeed -- and the flexible ebb and flow of the continuo, which is alternatively plucky with enthusiasm, seamlessly smooth, and never rigid. If this sounds good to you, go forward; in a season crowded with high quality Baroque chamber discs, BIS' Attillo Ariosti: The Stockholm Sonatas II could stand with the best of them.