Handel: Music for the Royal Fireworks; Water Music.(Martin Pearlman, Boston Baroque)(Product/Service Evaluation)

Martin Pearlman, Boston Baroque. Telarc CD-80594.

Time was, you couldn't get both the Fireworks Music and the Water Music on a single album. In the old days of vinyl, they simply wouldn't fit; then in the early CD days, record companies apparently thought the two works were too important to couple together, charging buyers double for separate discs.

Today, there are any number of recordings of the two pieces paired together, but there is still no want of variety on separate discs as well. For instance, do you want your Handel on period or modem instruments? Do you want the Fireworks Music with or without strings? Do you want a chamber-sized group or something approaching the one hundred players that were said to have first performed the piece? Decisions, decisions. Pinnock, Savall, McGegan, Leppard, Mackerras? They're all among my favorites, but this new entry from Martin Pearlman and his original-instruments group, Boston Baroque, is a good compromise for the beginning collector or for the Handel fan who has everything.

I wasn't too sure about Pearlman's interpretation when he ...