Luigi Boccherini (1743 -1805)
Quintets for Guitar and String Quartet Vol. 2
Quintet in D Major, G. 448
Quintet in D Major, G. 449
Quintet in G Major, G. 450
The Italian cellist and composer Luigi Boccherini was born in Lucca in
1743, the son of a double-bass player. His family was distinguished not on I y
in music, but boasted poets and dancers among its members. His eider brother
Giovan Gastone, born in 1742, was both dancer and poet, the author of the text
of Haydn's Il ritorno di Tobia and
the libretti of some earlier stage-works of the Vienna Court Composer, Antonio
Salieri. His sister Maria Ester was a dancer and married Onorato Viganò, a
distinguished dancer and choreographer. Her son, Salvatore Vigano, who studied
composition with Boccherini, occupies a position of considerable importance in
the history of ballet.
Boccherini was giving concerts as a cellist by the age of thirteen, and
in 1757 went with his father to Vienna, where they both were invited to join
the orchestra of the court theatre. Boccherini returned to Italy, but there
were further visits to Vienna, before he finally secured a position in his
native town. In 1766, however, he set out with his fellow-townsman, the
violinist Manfredi, a pupil of Nardini, for Paris, having performed with both
violinists and with Cambini in chamber music in Milan the previous year.
In France Boccherini and Manfredi won considerable success, and the
former continued his work as a composer, as well as appearing as a cello
virtuoso. In 1768 the pair left for Spain, where Boccherini seems to have lived
until his death in 1805. In Madrid he was appointed composer and virtuoso de
camera to the Infante Don Luis, younger brother of King Charles III. Part of
the following period he spent in Madrid and part at the Palace of Las Arenas in
the province of Avila, where the Infante retired after an unacceptable
marriage. Members of the Font family were employed by Don Luis as a string
quartet and renewed their association with Boccherini at the end of the century.
After the death of the Infante in 1785 the composer entered the service of the
Benavente-Osuna family. At the same time he was appointed court composer to
Friedrich Wilhelm, who in 1787 became King of Prussia, providing the
cello-playing king with new compositions on the same kind of exclusive
arrangement that he had earlier enjoyed with Don Luis. There is, however, no
evidence that Boccherini ever spent any time in Prussia. After the death of
Friedrich Wilhelm and the departure of other patrons from Madrid, Boccherini
received support from Lucien Bonaparte, French ambassador in Madrid, and
remained busy to the end of his life, although visitors reported that he lived
in all the appearance of poverty.
Boccherini's style is completely characteristic of the period in which
he lived, the period, that is, of Haydn rather than that of Mozart or
Beethoven. He enjoyed a reputation for his facility as a composer, leaving some
467 compositions. A great deal of his music is designed to exploit the
technical resources of the cello, in concertos, sonatas, and, particularly, in
chamber music for various numbers of instruments, including a remarkable series
of quintets with two cellos. The twelve quintets for guitar and string quartet,
of which eight have survived, are arrangements by the composer of works written
for pianoforte quintet in the late 1790s. The set of six quintets here recorded
were dedicated to the Marquès de Bénavent, an enthusiastic amateur guitarist.
The fourth of the series, in D major, starts with a Pastorale, in the mood of a
Baroque Christmas concerto and ends with a lively Spanish dance, the Fandango.
The fifth quintet, again in D major, has an extended series of eight
variations, forming its fourth movement. The group of quintets ends with a
four-movement work in G major.
The Hungarian guitarist Zoltán Tokos was born in Kolozsvar, where he
began his musical studies, continued subsequently at the Budapest Music Academy
under Szendrey Karper Laszlo, in Athens and in master classes with John
Williams and with Leo Brouwer. Since 1976 he has been a member of the teaching
staff of the Liszt Music Academy in Debrecen. As a performer he has given
concerts throughout Europe and his recordings include the Joaquin Rodrigo
Concierto de Aranjuez with the Budapest Strings. His guitar transcriptions have
been published by Editio Musica Budapest, Schott, Universal and Salabert.
Danubius Quartet
The Danubius Quartet has won considerable acclaim since its
establishment in 1983. With the violinists Judit Tóth and Adél Miklós, violist
Cecilia Bodolai and cellist Ilona Wibli, and the artistic direction of the
distinguished violinist Vilmos Tátrai, the quartet won awards at Trapani, Evian
and Graz in the earlier years of its foundation, and has recorded, among other
works, the String Quartet No.1
of
Reményi for Hungaroton, the complete String Quartets of Villa-Lobos for Marco
Polo and for Naxos the Mozart and Brahms Clarinet Quintets. The Danubius
Quartet has given recitals in Austria, Germany, Yugoslavia, Italy, France and
Switzerland and appeared at a number of international festivals.
