Does one rely too much on the benefit of hindsight to say that these quartets by the 12-year-old Rossini show signs of his operatic personality? Rossini himself certainly didn't find such signs; he disparaged and ridiculed these early efforts. He wrote in the margin of the manuscript (which somehow ended up in the Library of Congress in Washington) that he had composed and copied them in three days and performed them "doggishly" (cagnescamente) with a group of relatives. Yet they do seem operatic, and even characteristically Rossinian. The odd combination of two violins, cello, and bass creates a wide-open texture that focuses the attention purely on the composer's melodic invention, which was fertile even at this early stage. There are more quasi-vocal features than one might expect to find in the old three-movement instrumental sonata structure (such as the instrumental recitatives in the first movement of the third sonata, track 7), and the Rossini combination of flashy melody deployed over a spacious large-scale structure is in evidence in several places. The harmonic facility of these works makes clear that the young Rossini had studied his Mozart and Haydn. Perhaps what's happening is that the
Ensemble de I Virtuosi Italiani has delivered a first-rate performance, one that finds and emphasizes the best in the music. Anyone who loves Rossini or wants a bright, vigorous hour of Classical-era chamber music will be more than satisfied with this release.