Hellendaal: Cambridge Sonatas

My recent journey to the United Kingdom included a day in Cambridge, where I walked right past the Fitzwilliam Museum, which I could now kick myself for!—as the manuscript from this album is housed there! (But it of course may not be on display!)

I sampled this album some when it came out 5.5 years ago, but I wanted to come back and relish it with more time, given the context of my recent travels. The liner notes provide ample context for the music and the man who created it; like many other musicians during the Baroque, they left their home and found refuge as musicians in London, and as it was for the Dutchman Pieter Hellendaal ultimately, further afield, in Cambridge.

My previous exposure to his music was with his concertos, led by Roy Goodman with the European Community Baroque Orchestra. His style, as the music on this album will not betray, is a bit conservative given his age, but alas, no worries for us that like that baroque sound. The former recording reminded me of Handel, and the comparison is made again in this album’s liner notes.

Hellendaal was a violinist and organist; he’d studied with Tartini, if we’re concerned about his street cred. Tartini is a great foil, I think; I started my day today listening to Enrico Gatti’s traversal of Tartini’s sonatas and when moving this afternoon to this disc, that Italian flavor has returned.

As usual, the expectation when starting an Audax recording—especially those made by Johannes Pramsohler and his Ensemble Diderot—starts high. Six of the sonatas for violin and continuo are presented here, from his collection of twelve. Some are rendered in three movements, others in four. I’ll make mention of a few movements in the following paragraphs.

Sonata no. 3 in D minor • Allegro (II)

This piece makes me think of a comparison to one’s kitchen sink: there’s a lot going on in it. The multistopping brings me a memory of Bach’s Fugue for violin and continuo, BWV 1026; the omnipresence of the higher range of the violin makes me think of Tarini and some late Vivaldi, when and where violinists were extending the range of the instrument. Other elements of the writing are caught up in traditional baroque material, distinctive subjects that get repeated, maintaining rhythm. The idea was to win the audience over with something short and catchy, repeating it often enough to say “see, it’s the same thing, notice how I’m doing different things with it?” Well, I can’t say anyone said that, but the gist isn’t too far removed from the concept of taking a basic figure and repeating it in so-called minimalist music. Luckily for us, this is more harmonically rich material. Hellendaal works hard to cover the complete gamut of the violin, and the double stopping provides an additional challenge to the player, one at the time who would have been praised for his virtuosity.

I am not sure the piece deserves all praise; the character of the violin part seems almost disjointed or frantic, repeating the material, as such, in a combination of ways to impress the audience with the violinist’s technical prowess; before the end, the composer pulls the cellist into the mix, which musically speaking was a cool thing to do, alongside providing the violinist a small capriccio by himself, a nod, perhaps, to Locatelli?

Pramsohler showcases his own skills well; his intonation throughout isn’t perfect, but there’s a confidence about his playing, alongside the violin’s tone, that is always and attractive proposition.

Sonata no. 6 in D (I-II)

This opening movement too aims to push the violinist into its higher range; the basso continuo is interesting for how he seems to be introducing a type of triadic pattern, akin to an Alberti bass. The modernity of the piece makes me think it might have been more successful with just a fortepiano and the violin, if a right hand part had been provided?

The slow movement includes a lot of trills, fussy figurations that also invaded the piece mentioned above; this decoration comes across as slightly artificial to me. Against the rather pedantic harmonic direction he takes things, the melody itself might be called out for being somewhat rhetorical in nature. One can imagine call and response that seems built into the writing. This piece, while showing evidence of the intent to beguile the listener with the part written for violin, ultimately, for me, is not a well-written piece, as so far as we’re going to compare him with the likes of Tartini or Handel.

The second movement is more successful, compositionally; the melodic material is stronger, and the writing for the basso continuo seems more idiomatic. Lost opportunities, perhaps, for the composer to gone into more adventuresome harmonic territory. Sometimes when I”m expecting he’ll go in one direction he doesn’t; that surprise at first was a disappointment, but when he does transfer things to a new dominant? Well, the surprise is altogether fun as it’s not expected; there are two such twists, experienced about half-way, and three-quarters through the piece. The composer’s ending of phrases in this movement has a particular flair to it, when the piece doesn’t end, stretching the foundation so that the violin can keep climbing.

While I’m eager to suggest that it’s the type of thing an established composer like Handel might not have done, there’s still something quaint about it, in the composer’s attempt to not lead us to where we think he may be headed. I’m liable to believe he was someone who had a sense of humor about his personality, at least that’s how I’m reading his writing.

Sonata no. 2 in A (IV)

This movement is marked Allegro-Andante-Allegro. The fun nature of the composer comes out again, with a repeat lick that comes across as folksy. This material comes back after the Andante’s minor-moded conclusion, a short type of rondo or more correctly, ABA structure. The simple melodic material is made all the more gnarly with the way he’s written it, which is aligned with his style demonstrated in the other tracks. I wouldn’t have minded if Pramsohler would have squeezed a bit more of that folksy character out of this piece.

There’s little doubt in my mind that Hellendaal’s own audience would have found this movement fun.

Sonata no. 5 in C (II)

The first Allegro is peppered with more of the effects we’ve seen, enough finger work for the left hand, combined with double stopping. And just when we think the violinist is spending too much time in the comfy part of its range, he switches things up an octave, letting that E string sing with a lot of repeated notes.

The other technique exploited here is the figurations for the violin skipping between strings; again, jumping around gives the illusion of virtuosity; I almost get the sense that Hellendaal is making the piece unnecessarily difficult, and I am not sure the payoff is worth the strong technical challenge, musically.

Conclusions

I’m thankful for the three musicians represented on this album for taking on this music. Hellendaal is not a household name, and these pieces are technically challenging, in so far as they require dexterity in reproducing a lot of repeated figures cleanly, and secondarily, for going as high as they do on the fingerboard. I don’t know if Mr. Pramsohler uses a chin rest, but holding the instrument without that support and shifting can be a special challenge when playing the historical violin.

There’s only one other recording of Hellendaal’s violin sonatas I could find—recorded by Antoninette Lohmann and Furor Musicus—but in this case not the same collection verbatim. That said, as far as an introduction goes, this album by Johannes Pramsohler features superior playing and also acoustics.

As I said, it’s of little doubt that Hellendaal was interested in writing music that spoke to his audience and that he was committed to providing the challenges that a literate musical audience would have recognized as challenging, unless the performer had a good poker face?

After hearing this album, I’m less convinced that the composer in this case is a diamond in the rough, an unknown composer that should flock to hear with ample rewards. It brings to mind my first listen to Johann David Heinichen’s music when Musica Antiqua Köln released their groundbreaking double-CD set. Here was a name most of us never heard, and his music was colorful, sporty, and vibrant. Yet, after repeated listens? It was obvious while good, it wasn’t the same high quality we’d attributed to the works by Handel, Telemann, or Bach.

Even so—I think this music is worth your time. The composer no doubt holds interest for us, not only because of his association with the famous Tartini, but in his travels far from home, settling in the quieter university environment he found in Cambridge.

As usual, Pramsohler, Choi, and Grisvard give these pieces fresh air, and are committed to doing their best to present them to us. The faults I found in the composer’s compositional style, or reliance upon the same artifices are not theirs.

This music is quirky—in different ways than the music of Zelenka is quirky—but both composers took unconventional turns in their music. My advice when auditioning these sonatas is to let your mind lead you where you think you may be headed, and stay surprised when things keep going, maybe for too long, or do finally make a turn. These qualities about the music reveal to me its ultimate charm.