The most extensive survey ever produced of music by an outstanding Baroque violinist-composer whose accomplishment and originality has only been rediscovered in recent years.
In 2009, Brilliant Classics released the first album ever dedicated to the music of Carlo Tessarini. His music had featured before in a few compilations of Italian Baroque chamber music, but only with this, and three further collections also issued by Brilliant Classics, has the stature of Tessarini become clear, as among the most individual and impressive contemporaries of better-known violinist-composers such as Pietro Locatelli and Arcangelo Corelli.
This set compiles several of those previous albums to present an attractive, budget-priced introduction to the appealing world of Tessarini. The historically informed interpretations communicate a lively sympathy for his music, and extensive booklet notes give full details of his life and career, in so far as they can be traced in the historical record, as well as discussions of the salient features of the music.
Born in the Adriatic port of Rimini in 1690, Tessarini moved north to Venice for his training, and joined the musicians attached to the Basilica San Marco. His own compositions seemed to have travelled across Europe before he did, thanks to their fresh and appealing melodies and elegant construction. Thus his rising reputation enabled him to undertake extensive tours as a violinist, and eventually he settled in Holland (possibly the city of Arnhem), where he died in 1767.
The Op.9 collection of trio sonatas dates from Tessarini’s years in Venice and then Urbino, while the Op 12 and Op.14 set of sonatas belong to his touring years in the late 1740s. Engaging and various as these collections are in themselves, they only scratch the surface of Tessarini’s productivity. He published at least 20 opus-numbered collections, and his surviving output amounts to around 280 works including 40 concertos. While his music could be summarised as a skilful synthesis between a Vivaldian, Venetian idiom and a new, French-accented galant style, Tessarini evolved and developed like every artist of note, and this set traces a portion of that personal development. Anyone who has not encountered Tessarini before will find that this set presents an ideal opportunity to make amends.
