This new album by the Akademie Für Alte Musik celebrates the tercentenary of the birth ofKing Frederick the Great (1713 - 1786) with some choice repertoire. Since Frederick’s court was an epicenter of high-end music making there’s lots of interesting composers to chose from and the ensemble has made some daring choices. Rather than perform generic Quantz and Benda flute pieces, the ensemble has wisely programmed music by Johann Gottlieb Graun, Christoph Nichelmann and Carl Philipp Emmanuel Bach and a flute sonata by the King himself.Johann Gottlieb Graun, the older brother of the better-known opera composer Carl Heinrich Graun, has two works on the recording. The elder Graun’s Ouvertüre and Allegro is a pleasing sinfonia-like piece with an extended French overture in dotted rhythms, bustling fugue and second movement Allegro that’s memorable for its solo oboe writing. The King’s court was known for its gamba players so Graun’s Concerto for Viola da Gamba isn’t such an anomaly (apparently Graun wrote five gamba concertos). Gambist Jan Freiheit plays the solo part with fleet fingers in the churning outer movements and sensitivity in the expressive Adagio. Another under the radar composer, Bach student Christoph Nichelmann, is represented by a Concerto for Harpsichord (one of 20 that he wrote). The keyboard part, played with brio on the fortepiano by Raphael Alpermann, is virtuosic and certainly places the concerto at the crossroads of the Baroque and Classical eras, particularly in the lovely song-like Adagio.
