Passacaille Records and cellist Elinor Frey, with harpsichordist Federica Bianchi, lutenist Giangiacomo Pinard, and cellist Mauro Valli, present the first recording of cello sonatas by Giuseppe Clemente Dall’Abaco (1710-1805).

Dall’Abaco’s sonatas are full of cantabile melodies with the lightness of folksongs, passagework that demands brilliance and facility, and extraordinary slow movements that bring out the natural beauty of the cello’s tone. Dall’Abaco was a celebrated cellist-composer who participated in significant concerts in many of the major musical centres of Europe, among them London, Paris, Vienna, Verona, Munich and Bonn. In these five sonatas, we find individual movements devoted to regional styles and instrumental exoticisms such as La Zampogna (Italian bagpipe), Amodo di Arciliuto, and A modo di Viola da gamba. Frey’s recording includes the original version of the G Major Cello Sonata previously attributed to G.B. Sammartini by way of a borrowed version by Martin Berteau.

Booklet: EN, FR, DE