REVIEWS

MusicaAntigua.com (Spain), June 2023

“The Dutch recorder player Lobke Sprenkeling and the Spanish harpsichordist Jorge López-Escribano have published earlier this year “Pulchra Es”, a selection of Early Italian Baroque pieces performed by the recorder with the accompaniment of harpsichord and organ. Although most of them belong to the 17th century, many show a Renaissance heritage that places them in full transition between the two centuries. The result consists of melodies of pure sound, transmitters of a calmness that invites meditation and introspection.

Sprenkeling teaches the recorder, as well as ornamentation techniques and historical improvisation, at the Royal Conservatory of Music in Madrid, and regularly collaborates with leading Early Music ensembles, such as La Ritirata, Concerto 1700, Capella de Ministers or Harmonía del Parnàs, among others. For his part, Jorge López-Escribano has an extensive career as a harpsichordist in Europe and has collaborated with numerous groups from Belgium, the Netherlands, France, Norway, and, of course, Spain, and is also the founder of the Ensemble Sopra il Basso, a group that was selected as Ensemble in Residence in 2012 for the Ambronay festival (France).

Pulchra Es shows the chromatic possibilities of the recorder in Early Music, specifically, in music composed around the 17th century. Just as the Renaissance recorder was conceived as an ensemble instrument for the interpretation of polyphony in vocal style, the pieces included in this album present the instrument in all its soloist splendor. The revolution of Florentine Camerata in Italy imposes the change from polyphony to monody, which is the main transition that Baroque music brings with it. One of its main theorists, Count Giovanni Bardi, considered that wind instruments were preferred over others because they best imitate the human voice. Among these instruments, Bardi considered the characteristics of each one (the trombones sounded sleepy, the cornettos represented vitalism...), and established that the recorder showed an intermediate character, and, therefore, we can deduce that it must be widely used to create melodies.

In the late 17th century, Italian composers began to create abstract instrumental music for consorts or parts of consorts. Forms such as Recercata or Fantasia were instrumental pieces that were not based on dances like other previous instrumental music, but rather constituted their takeoff as an independent genre. One of the authors present on this CD is Girolamo Frescobaldi, whose work somehow bridges the gap between Renaissance and Baroque music, providing a canzona, a style imported from the Parisian vocal chanson that will be the genesis of the sonata, and being also the author of a toccata on the CD.

Likewise, the recording contains works by father and son Rognoni, an outstanding family of musicians and founders of one of the first violin schools in Milan. By Dario Castello, who in 1621 introduced the genre of sonata concertata in stile moderno in his first collection of instrumental music, the piece Sonata seconda has been included. The disc is completed with works by Giovanni Battista Bovicelli, Giovanni Battista Fontana, Giovanni Bassano and Pandolfi Mealli.

This album presented by Lobke Sprenkeling and Jorge López-Escribano is undoubtedly a little gem, an exercise in good taste and preciousness that invites contemplation while evoking with its sounds the conjugation of light and shadows.”

Pablo Rodríguez Canfranc

Blokfluitist (The Netherlands), May 2023

“Mainly 17th-century Italian canzonas, sonatas and ricercatas: that summarizes what can be heard here. A selection from this specific literature segment with celebrities Castello, Frescobaldi, Rognoni and their contemporaries, contained in eleven tracks and an hour of complete surrender to beneficent Italian musical aesthetics.

This applies not only to the general programming, but at the same time also to the choice of instruments, which here seems well-considered and is in line with the music style as such, but also appears to be congruent between the players themselves. The choice of a certain type of flute does not seem to me to be a coincidence and often enhances the atmosphere and the general rhetoric; a good example of this is the opening piece. Both the keyboard instruments and the recorders themselves bear witness to a spicy and personal character, which of course only comes into its own thanks to the colourful divisions of thirds and fifths, but also with the relaxed and flexible breath control and blowing technique used here. The continuo also does not shy away from occasionally adding a register in open and wide-drawn passages. Then just too strong, you say? Rather a matter of auditory luxury that we have lost a bit, I think. Storylines are always built up logically, smoothly and energetically, so that as a listener you find yourself in a world full of variety, emotion and stillness, while you still retain the feeling that you are constantly on the same stylistic continent.

It is a traditional succession of style-related elements, well thought out, interpreted with expertise, it runs like clockwork and it looks like a pearl necklace: at the end you can start again for another round…”

Koen Dieltiens

Scherzo (Spain), April 2023

“Lobke Sprenkeling is a Dutch recorder player who teaches at Madrid Royal Conservatory and Jorge López-Escribano is a Spanish harpsichordist who finished his studies at The Hague Conservatory under the tutelage of the now retired Jacques Ogg. Without going into further detail, it therefore seems logical that Sprenkeling and López-Escribano began working together several years ago. But it had to be the covid pandemic that encouraged them to undertake a recording project and, incidentally, to create a new label: LBK Records.

Although, as Sprenkeling herself points out in the CD notes, it is a program of baroque music, several of the composers included are more Renaissance: Palestrina, Bovicelli, De Milán, Crecquillon, De Rore, Rognoni (I’m not sure why, but the latter appears in the disc information sometimes as 'Rognoni' and other times as 'Rognioni'). But it is no less true that during the first decades of the 17th century there were quite a few authors who dedicated themselves to composing or improvising based on works by those who had preceded them (this practice is still alive today).

As our protagonists indicate, we are facing "a contemplative musical journey through a world of contrasts, light, color and shadows. And also, an "intimate musical journey through the music that sings in our minds, in our hearts, in our souls." Indeed, what we hear oozes intimacy. And subtlety. It is a true delicatessen, not only for the beauty of the music, but also for the exquisite interpretation of Sprenkeling (who uses four different models of recorder) and López-Escribano. Everything here is good, but I prefer the marvel that is Sonata seconda op.3, “La Cesta”, by the great Pandolfi Mealli (who, curiously, ended his days in Madrid).”

Eduardo Torrico

Rest in Peace. Thank you always, Eduardo.

Windkanal (Germany), March 2023:

“One of the focal points in the repertoire of Lobke Sprenkeling, who teaches at the Royal Conservatory in Madrid, is the Italian repertoire from the late Renaissance and early Baroque periods. This is also the focus of her debut CD. In addition to the well-known diminutions by Bovicelli, Rognoni, and Taeggio, sonatas and canzonas by Castello, Frescobaldi, Fontana, and Pandolfi Mealli are also heard.

Jorge López-Escribano provides the continuo on organ and harpsichord, contributing a sovereign performance of Frescobaldi's Toccata Quinta from 1617. 

Sprenkeling has such a polished technique and musical sensitivity that she does not need to showcase herself in the works. Her playing exudes a sovereign calm and sonorous beauty (Pulchra es!) that is enviable. She does not try to demonstrate how fast she can play, but simply plays fast and with a soft yet precise and variable articulation where the music requires it. Each phrase is consciously crafted towards its peak, aided by her internally swinging rhythm. It is also appreciable that she wrote the informative booklet text herself, which is only available in Spanish and English.”

Elise v. Husten

A PERSONAL NOTE

I often jokingly say that I have a 17th-century soul. But there is a truth in it: there is something in the music of the 17th century that just resonates with me. Its sonorities are rich and flavourful, splendid and obscure, such beauty in its harmonies coming from the Renaissance that I remain deeply moved before this music. It’s not just expressive but above all experimental, on the verge of where it’s about to plunder out of equilibrium. It has a whole language of its own, between the Renaissance and the Baroque, and it speaks to my soul. We understand each other.

But such is not enough. The music requires musicians who have technical excelence and yet dare to play with that equilibrium, who understand the counterpunctal layers and yet let the music sing, and above all, who connect with each other in the music’s dialogue. With Jorge, all this is possible. Jorge and I have been playing together for quite some time now, and not only a musical bond but also a close friendship has grown out of it.

In the pandemics, the long-cherished wish for a recording of our 17th-century repertoire finally became a reality. A year’s preparation of this particular virtuosic repertoire, with care and open exploration. LBK Records was born and the long learning road to publishing a CD and opening up a record label began.

The result is here in front of you. You’ll listen to an intimate musical journey through the music that sings in our heads, in our hearts, in our souls. I truly hope you’ll enjoy it as much as I love this music.

Yours,

Lobke

Music Samples