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Product Description
Amazon.co.uk Review
Haydn's music was immensely popular in eighteenth-century France; and it was while staying in the French capital itself during 1785-6 that he composed his very fine set of six Paris Symphonies, Nos. 82 to 87. The first three come nicely packaged on this Sony Vivarte release, with Bruno Weil conducting the Canadian period-instrument orchestra Tafelmusik. Haydn seems to have been in terpsichorean mood throughout the Paris set. The finale of Symphony No. 82 gives it the sobriquet Bear, for people thought they heard a kind of music that might have accompanied a dancing bear. Tafelmusik capture the high-spirited mood perfectly, high horns, trumpets and kettledrums blazing. Symphony No. 83 has come down to us as The Hen because of the clucking oboe that accompanies part of the second subject. That cluck is resolutely rendered here, during a dynamic "Allegro spiritoso" animated by latent power. A lively "Andante", bucolic "Menuet" and racy "Vivace" finale follow, with Tafelmusik again seeming genuinely to relish the overall bonhomie. The somewhat more subdued 84th Symphony in E flat rounds off the disc with no less allure--an atmospheric, almost Brucknerian "Largo" opening, ceding into an up-tempo "Allegro", contrasting subtle "Andante", Viennese-sounding "Minuet" and military finale. Indeed, "military" precision and attack can be evinced throughout these exciting and energetic readings. Roger Norrington with his London Classical Players affords comparison but the high-definition Canadians have the edge. --Duncan Hadfield
