The London Baroque's traversal of the Baroque trio sonata across its various developments over time and into diverse national styles enters somewhat arcane territory here with a program of English trio sonatas of the 18th century. The program is chronological, at least by publication (the Op. 5 set of trio sonatas by Handel, though published in 1759, was assembled from earlier music from a variety of genres), and the pieces represented run from one of the first English examples of the trio sonata to Classical-style music in ...
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The London Baroque's traversal of the Baroque trio sonata across its various developments over time and into diverse national styles enters somewhat arcane territory here with a program of English trio sonatas of the 18th century. The program is chronological, at least by publication (the Op. 5 set of trio sonatas by Handel, though published in 1759, was assembled from earlier music from a variety of genres), and the pieces represented run from one of the first English examples of the trio sonata to Classical-style music in which the harpsichord continuo is almost superfluous. The chief point of interest here is the presence of some little-recorded composers: the second tier of Charles Avison, William Boyce, Carl Abel, and Thomas Arne, and the still rarer John Ravenscroft and Thomas Erskine, the sixth Earl of Kelly in Scotland. Ravenscroft was an Englishman who traveled to Italy at the end of the 17th century, probably studied with Corelli, and produced a facsimile of his style competent enough that 40...
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