Telemann, Georg Philipp: Don Quixote; La Lyra; Overture in D.(Sound Recording Review)

Telemann, Georg Philipp: Don Quixote; La Lyra; Overture in D (orchestral suites). Northern Chamber Orchestra, conducted by Nicholas Ward from his position at the front of the violin section. Recorded in 1996, in Victoria Hall, Bolton, United Kingdom. Engineer: John Taylor. 57+ minutes. Naxos 8.5554019.

Anyone who has read more than a few of my recording reviews probably realizes that I consider Telemann a major composer, almost on a level with J. S. Bach, Beethoven, Haydn, and Mozart. Indeed, his best music can hold its own with the best those gentlemen produced, and when he was alive he was considered by many to be J. S. Bach's musical peer.

Telemann's father was a Lutheran clergyman, and although he might have followed in father's footsteps, his musical talents were such that a short while after he entered Leipzig University in 1701 he founded the University Collegium Musicum--an organization that his friend J. S. Bach was to later direct. In 1703 (at 22 years of age) he became musical director of the Leipzig Opera, and while there composed some twenty operas himself. Four years older than Bach, Telemann outlived him seventeen years and by the time of his death Haydn was thirty-five and Mozart was eleven. His musical style developed with the times, from the late Baroque to the style galant exemplified by his godson, C.P.E. Bach.

The Quixote suite featured on this disc exemplifies the style of his later years, with light-hearted approach that depicts episodes in the knight's ...