Claudio Astronio, Stefano Molardi - C.P.E Bach: Six Concertos Wq43 Transcribed for 2 Harpsichords (2023)

Carl Philipp Emanuel Bach wrote this set of six keyboard concertos Wq43 once he had been released from the constricting service to Frederick the Great of Prussia. He moved from Potsdam to Hamburg, and began composing there with new-found freedom. Published in 1772, these concertos are among the first-fruits of such liberated imagination.
CPE designated them as ‘six easy harpsichord concertos’, with the same ‘Liebhaber’ in mind as the cultivated amateur audience for some of his keyboard sonatas. Nonetheless, the solo parts of these works will test the mettle of any aspiring or proven virtuoso. Their greatest originality, though, lies in their form. Each concerto is written cyclically, or continuously, meaning that one movement leads directly into the next. Even the cadenzas are fully written out, anticipating in this regard Beethoven’s ‘Emperor’ Concerto of two generations later.
While tautly disciplined in this way, the concertos are also full of CPE’s flights of fancy: nowhere more so than the No.4, in which the initial Allegro suddenly veers into an Adagio episode, and just as abruptly transforms into a Minuet. A cadenza unites the themes of all three movements or episodes before a final reprise of the Allegro: unprecedented, even for CPE.
Tracklist
01. Harpsichord Concerto No. 1 in F Major, Wq43/1: I. Allegro Molto
02. Harpsichord Concerto No. 1 in F Major, Wq43/1: II. Andante
03. Harpsichord Concerto No. 1 in F Major, Wq43/1: III. Prestissimo
04. Harpsichord Concerto No. 2 in D Major, Wq43/2: I. Allegro di molto (Andante, allegro di molto andante, allegro di Molto)
05. Harpsichord Concerto No. 2 in D Major, Wq43/2: II. Andante
06. Harpsichord Concerto No. 2 in D Major, Wq43/2: III. Allegretto
07. Harpsichord Concerto No. 3 in E-Flat Major, Wq43/3: I. Allegro
08. Harpsichord Concerto No. 3 in E-Flat Major, Wq43/3: II. Larghetto
09. Harpsichord Concerto No. 3 in E-Flat Major, Wq43/3: III. Presto
10. Harpsichord Concerto No. 4 in C Minor, Wq43/4: I. Allegro Assai
11. Harpsichord Concerto No. 4 in C Minor, Wq43/4: II. Poco Adagio
12. Harpsichord Concerto No. 4 in C Minor, Wq43/4: III. Tempo di Minuetto
13. Harpsichord Concerto No. 4 in C Minor, Wq43/4: IV. Allegro Assai
14. Harpsichord Concerto No. 5 in G Major, Wq43/5: I. Adagio (Presto)
15. Harpsichord Concerto No. 5 in G Major, Wq43/5: II. Adagio
16. Harpsichord Concerto No. 5 in G Major, Wq43/5: III. Allegro
17. Harpsichord Concerto No. 6 in C Major, Wq43/6: I. Allegro di Molto
18. Harpsichord Concerto No. 6 in C Major, Wq43/6: II. Larghetto
19. Harpsichord Concerto No. 6 in C Major, Wq43/6: III. Allegro