DESCRIPTION:
Allesandro Stradella (1639-1682)

'Sonata for Eight Strings with Trumpet'
Movement 1: Allegro

Back to the seventeenth century, when instrumental music in the home rivalled the popularity of opera in the theater, and trio sonatas were the order of the day. This is actually a confusing misnomer since the line-up for a trio sonata did not necessarily involve three players - it was usually two solo instruments, such as violins, supported by cello and harpsichord filling out the bass. Thousands of such pieces were written and performed, and when the accompaniment of harpsichord and cello was enhanced by the addition of a few extra supporting string instruments, then the sonata had made the short journey that transformed it into a concerto.

Just how vague the terminology of the time was it demonstrated by a 'Sonata for Eight Strings with Trumpet' written by Allesandro Stradella in 1682; it is nothing less than a miniature concerto for double string orchestra with the addition of a bright and merry trumpet part between the opposing forces. Stradella, incidentally, while riot in the first division of Baroque composers, is worth mentioning for his colouful life. He was of noble birth, and after musical studies in Bologna he set up as a composer in Rome, leading a distinctly rackety life on the side. He got into all sorts of scrapes with the authorities and was eventually forced to flee the city ending up in Venice as music teacher to the youth mistress of a powerful aristocrat by the name of Alvise Contarini. It was not long before he first had his way and then ran away with her, pursued by the angry aristocrat with a bunch of hired ruffians. According to legend the assassins caught up with Stradella in a church in Turin where he was directing one of his works, but the beauty of the music softened their hearts and instead of killing him they warned him to get out of town.

He ended up in Genoa, playing fast and loose this time with a married noblewoman whose outraged brothers had him bumped off by an altogether ess musical hit man. Stradella was a highly skilled and extremely prolific composer, famous in his time for his operas and oratorios. One of the latter, San Giovanni Battista (St. John the Baptist) is still occasionally performed and is also coincidentally the piece which is supposed to have changed the minds of his would-be murderers in Turin.

Jürgen Schuster, trumpet
Cologne Chamber Orchestra
conducted by Helmut Müller-Brühl