Reicha, Romberg: Concertos for Two Cellos

Two world premiere recordings are included on Vol. 2 of the Beethoven Erkundungen by Reinhard Goebel: The Concertino by Romberg and the Divertisment by Eybler. Apart from that, it is about double cellos – with two members of the Berlin Philharmonic Orchestra.

Already the first album of Reinhard Goebel’s recording project “Beethoven’s World” with violin concertos by Franz Clement (jpc 9522547) received great attention and excellent reviews worldwide. The Welt am Sonntag even dedicated two pages to the composer as an outstanding discovery and concluded: “If the discovery of Beethoven contemporaries, which Goebel has just signed up for the Beethoven Year, continues in this way, it will be a fine year” SWR2 also praised the project: “Reinhard Goebel promises further exciting explorations of Beethoven’s world after these two violin concertos by Clement.” Now Sony Classical is releasing the second album with two rarities by Beethoven contemporaries: Concerts for 2 cellos and orchestra are few and far between, and even less in the quality shown here: The Concertino op. 72 by Bernhard Romberg (1767-1841) is a world premiere recording. The work is a gigantic tour de force with only the most necessary breathers for the two soloists and a bolero finale in which really all the stops are pulled out left and right. The insanely virtuoso Sinfonia Concertante by Antonín Reicha (1770-1836) is full of creative experiments and shows clear references to Beethoven’s novel musical grammar. These double cello concertos were recorded with the cellists Stephan Koncz and Bruno Delepelaire and the German Radio Philharmonic Orchestra Saarbrücken Kaiserslautern under the direction of Reinhard Goebel. Another world premiere recording worth discovering in Beethoven’s circle is the third work on the album: a “Divertisment for Shrove Tuesday” by the composer and then Vienna Court Kapellmeister Joseph Eybler (1765-1846).