Simon Balicourt

Sonatas in b-moll und C-Dur

Sonata 1 opens with a movement marked 'Sostenuto' and expresses to perfection the melancholy gracefulness associated with B minor. A vivacious Allegro follows, kaleidoscopic in its ever-changing rhythmic patterns, and the work concludes with a charming homage to the French style, in the form of a gavotte en rondeau.The opening movement of Sonata 2, containing some exquisite harmonic turns, displays what Quantz called the prächtig ('magnificent') style, with a pompously striding bass and heavily dotted rhythms for the flute. The subsequent Allegro moderato features jaunty syncopations interspersed with rapid flurries of demisemiquavers, and the piece ends with a sparkling 'applause finale', which is frothy but never trivial.