Telemann, Don Quixotte Burlesque Suite

 
The composer Georg Philipp Telemann, the most significant representative of the North German school during the first half of the 18th century, was capable of writing a four-part motet with the same ease an ordinary person writes a letter. At least, this is what his young friend Handel — four years younger than Telemann — told him, whom he met in Leipzig when, under family pressure, Telemann began law studies that he would soon abandon.

A self-taught musician
Born in 1681 in Magdeburg, a city in western Germany, on the banks of the Elbe, Georg Philipp came from a family with a strong Protestant tradition, several of whose members had been pastors. His first training was humanistic and very broad: when he was just a boy, he wrote verses in Latin, German and French. His musical training, on the other hand, has a weak base in the period in which he had to attend the cathedral school where he attended the teachings of a composer of ecclesiastical music and also a keyboard course which, interestingly enough, lasted exactly fourteen days.

The fact remains, however, that at the age of ten Georg Philipp played the flute, violin and other instruments with mastery. On the basis of the direct study of the scores of the great composers of the time, the young Telemann soon began to compose his own pieces. 

Georg P. Telemann
(1681 - 1767)

An extensive catalog
Throughout his life, the catalog of this self-taught composer was going to acquire gigantic dimensions, far surpassing, for example, the work of Vivaldi. He cultivated all kinds of genres: operas, religious cantatas and psalms, passions, oratorios, profane cantatas, and much more, to which a large number of pieces of vocal and instrumental music is added.

A great naturalness distinguishes Telemann's music, which allows it to easily reach a wide audience. The composer argued that the musician who wanted to reach a large audience should write better than one who addresses a select minority. A good example of this maxim is represented by the suite inspired by Don Quixote.

Don Quixotte Burlesque Suite
During his last years, Telemann was strongly attracted by the spirit of Cervantes's work, to the point that it served as inspiration for an opera and, from it, a Suite for string orchestra and basso continuo, known as Don Quixotte Burlesque.

Light in character, almost humorous, the Suite includes seven movements or sections:

00:00  Ouverture
03:55  Le reveille de Quixotte (The awakening of Don Quixote)
06:58  Son attaque des moulens a vent (The attack on the windmills)
08:44  Les soupirs amoureux apres la Princesse Dulcinèe (Sighs of love for Dulcinea)
12:38  Sanche Panche berné (Sancho Panza disappointed)
14:22  Le galop de Rosinante alternat, avec sequent (The gallop of Rocinante)
16:59  La couché de Quixotte (Don Quixote's dream)

The rendition, performed with period instruments, is by the New York Baroque Incorporated chamber group.

Rossini, The Barber of Seville - Overture

 
When, in 1816, the Italian composer Giovanni Paisiello learned that an opera entitled Almaviva, ossia L'inutile precauzione, was about to be premiered at the Argentina theater in Rome, he had no hesitation in gathering his cohort of adherents and attending en masse at the work premiere with the sole and express purpose of causing excesses and turning the premiere into a failure from which its author, Gioacchino Rossini, could never recover.

The truth is that Paisiello was right in behaving that way. Almost forty years ago, he had premiered an opera also based, like Rossini's, on a libretto that emerged from Beaumarchais's comedy, Le Barbier de Séville ou la Précaution inutile. The work had been widely accepted in its time. So, Paisiello regarded as a personal affront that the young Rossini, an author of "Muslim works", dared to compose a new version of the opera that had made him famous, even when he offered it with another title.

Gioachino Rossini (1792 - 1868)

An ill-fated premiere
And indeed, the first performance, on February 20, 1816, did nothing but make things easier to provoke the brawl. The premiere was full of errors and mistakes that provoked mockery and blunders from the audience, unwittingly joining to the unruly spirits of Paisiello supporters. It is even said that at a certain moment, even a cat took the stage.

However, Paisiello and his entourage were likely the main responsible for the failure, since the second performance, a few days later, was a high success, and has continued so until today, to the point that The Barber of Seville exhibits nowadays the accolade of being the most performed opera in the world.

A "borrowed" overture
The work was composed in three weeks, forcing Rossini to make use not only of arias from other operas. The overture presented here borrowed, with some orchestration changes, the overture from a previous opera, Aureliano en Palmira, which had not been well received in its time. Rossini, entirely rightly, considered that the overture was of such quality that it could not be tied to a minor work. It had to be re-released.

The rendition is by the Metropolitan Opera House Orchestra conducted by the Italian maestro Maurizio Benini.