ALC_0165_Virtuoso Recital For Bassoon And String Trio

The works recorded in this album share several features, the most obvious being the ensemble (a comparatively rare combination of bassoon and string trio). However, a striking aspect they have in common is the fate of their composers. All of them were very well-known during their lifetime, and then fell into comparative oblivion. Their names once rivalled those of Haydn, Mozart, or Beethoven, but for more than a century after their deaths virtually nobody remembered their legacy. Only recently have their figures and works begun to be appreciated again as they deserve.
This album includes two bassoon quartets by François Devienne, who was a poly-instrumentalist. One of his flute students, Guillou, maintained that he was almost unrivalled as a flutist, but even greater as a bassoonist. Devienne performed regularly in many prestigious ensembles, including a regimental band and a court chapel attached to Cardinal de Rohan, as well as in a Masonic orchestra and at the Théâtre de Monsieur in Paris. He was also a professor at the Conservatory of Paris, and contributed to the education of generations of musicians. His teaching method has been preserved in a treatise (1795) and his works for winds contributed highly to the popularization of wind instruments as solo protagonists of major works. His Trois Quatuors pour Basson, Violon, Alto et Basse op. 73 were composed just a few years after the treatise (1798) and dedicated to a certain Garnier from Lyon, who likely was François Joseph Garnier.