J.S. BACH: Brandenburg Concerto No. 2, BWV 1047r - III. Allegro assai

SVAPINGA CONSORT on historical instruments
Maria Raffaele & Robert Selinger, artistic directors

Horn: Olivier Picon
Flauto dolce: Elisabeth Wirth
Oboe: Maria Raffaele
Violin: Amy Shen
Violoncello: Edouard Catalan
Harpsichord: Robert Selinger

Recorded in the Albert-Lempp-Saal of the Kreuzkirche in Schwabing, Munich, 22-23 July 2019.

Audio: Lukas Froschauer
Video: Johannes Winkler

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In this recording, the Svapinga Consort performs a very special chamber music version of Johann Sebastian Bach’s Brandenburg Concerto No.2. The standard orchestral version features four soloists (trumpet, recorder, oboe, and violin) accompanied by a string orchestra and a continuo group. Here we present the work as a chamber music concerto—a genre particularly beloved in royal courts of the 18th century—with the trumpet solo part played on the baroque horn.

Why perform this work in such a seemingly unusual instrumentation? There are two very intriguing reasons for this alternative. The first is that historians are reasonably confident that the tutti violin parts of at least the Second Brandenburg Concerto’s final movement were not original, but rather additions made to a pre-existing piece for four soloists and basso continuo as a means of better aligning the work’s instrumentation with that of the other Brandenburg Concertos.

And why the horn? Original parts copied by J.S. Bach’s student Christian Friedrich Prenzel in 1750 include a trumpet part with the clear annotation “tromba o vero corno da caccia”—meaning “trumpet or horn”—giving horn players the clear justification to perform the part an octave lower. We find that this version works incredibly well, and in particular when it comes to performing the concerto as a chamber music work: the lower tessitura and more mellow sonorities of the horn alleviate potential difficulties of balance between the different instrumental soloists.

Movement 1: https://youtu.be/1kCxF2kJev4
Movement 2: https://youtu.be/aHVnsJogqrQ
Movement 3: https://youtu.be/FnrzKRUGU-s

Видео J.S. BACH: Brandenburg Concerto No. 2, BWV 1047r - III. Allegro assai канала Svapinga Consort