The glass harmonica enjoys periodic revivals, but new material is seldom written for it. The standard items are performed and recorded with some regularity, most often the two Mozart pieces and Johann Friedrich Reichardt's delightful Rondeau, which are included here. What makes this collection interesting, aside from its status as a broad survey of the literature, is the inclusion of rarely heard works and some new compositions. Especially noteworthy is the "Mad Scene" from Donizetti's Lucia di Lammermoor, with the original glass harmonica part restored. The instrument's eerie ringing considerably heightens the scene's strangeness. Beethoven's peculiar Melodram is also fun to hear. There are works by minor eighteenth-century composers -- Schulz, Naumann, Röllig, and Apell -- all of which sound of their time and have their charms. Added to these are a new piece by the performer,
Thomas Bloch, and three pastiches by his contemporary, Johann von Holt Sombach.
Bloch's Sancta Maria is a modest but competent work, delivered here with a postmodern treatment of its multi-tracked vocal parts. Holt Sombach's appropriation of an eighteenth-century style is eccentric at best, though his three pieces are innocuous enough in themselves. However, one is left to wonder what use might be made of this instrument in a more inventive composer's hands.