This is my third review
of the Rosary Sonatas in the last couple
of years and falls soon after the latest
entrant, Pavlo Beznosiuk.
http://www.musicweb.uk.net/classrev/2004/May04/Biber_Rosary.htm
http://www.musicweb.uk.net/classrev/2002/Jun02/Biber.htm
Rather than draw any
grandiose conclusions about works that,
more than most, fared poorly in the
78 and LP eras and are now flourishing
on CD, it’s surely better to welcome
the diversity and catholicity of approaches
available to players when it comes to
these powerfully expressive works. Whether
this is in the modern set up violin,
with just organ to accompany, of Gabriela
Demeterova or Beznosiuk’s original instrument
continuo group these are works that
resonate in imaginative hands.
Monica Huggett plays
the first nine sonatas in the first
volume of her edition, whereas Beznosiuk’s
was a 2 CD set with readings by Timothy
West interspersed between the sonatas.
Demeterova played the first seven and
the great Passacaglia on her Supraphon
disc noted above – but demarcation
lines doubtless exist in this work.
Generalists will take an overview but
specialists will look to such as Holloway
and Moroney or Beznosiuk or Reiter with
Concordia. Huggett is not quite as susceptible
as Beznosiuk to intense rapture, which
led him, on occasion, to a daring communion
that stretched the line (as in the Passacaglia).
She finds warmth and a joyful dancing
momentum in the early sonatas, The Joyful
Mysteries; the Allaman of the second,
Mary’s Visit to Elizabeth, is
especially affectionate and the accompaniment
is tactful and apposite. I liked her
delineation of the drama of the third,
The Birth of Christ, with intimacies
and the optimism of the middle movements
balanced by the drama of the concluding
Adagio. Similarly the Ciacona representing
(should we take these Sonatas literally,
which isn’t always wise or helpful)
The Presentation in the Temple augurs
well for Huggett’s Passacaglia. She
takes it with linearity and a sure sense
of direction.
When the Sonatas deepen,
in the Sorrowful Mysteries, we find
her Sixth Sonata’s Adagio very precisely
articulated and the Sarabande of The
Scourging particularly interior. I was
keen to hear the Ninth, The Carrying
of the Cross, where Biber’s unacademic
inclusiveness admits of folk-like elements.
Here Sonnerie conspire to give us a
cimbalom-like sonority that speaks of
universal, not academic, acceptance.
The sound is warm with
not too much echo. The only blot is
that Gaudeamus hasn’t separately tracked
each individual movement – if you want
to find, say, the Double Presto in The
Crowning with Thorns you’d better have
your fast forward finger ready.
Jonathan Woolf
Sonnerie 
