Rijen, Jörgen - trombone
Combattimento Consort Amsterdam
Jan Willem de Vriend - conductor

Trombonist Jorgen van Rijen is one of the few musicians who is among the elite of his profession when playing either a modern or a baroque instrument. This is something of a rarity among brass players, since most of Van Rijen's colleagues find the two styles mutually incompatible. He was bitten by the bug when he was still a student and arrived in Lyon. There he met the baroque specialist Daniel Lassalle, who was giving lessons in the technique of playing historical trombones. Lassalle brought Van Rijen's attention to the small number of surviving trombone concerti from the early Classical period and the extensive body of baroque music for small ensembles which combined the trombone with strings and continuo. It was a revelation for Van Rijen to discover that it was possible to execute rapid running passages and delicate ornaments with the baroque trombone. Although you need a lot of breath to play a modern trombone, you don't need much more than a sigh to make the baroque instrument sound. That means that you can play all kinds of very intricate figuration and curlicues.
There are almost no trombonists of the baroque period whose names have come down to us, but there did turn out to be a certain gifted performer behind the early Classic works. He was a trombonist whose striking technical and musical abilities inspired the composers of his time, just as Van Rijen does today. The man's name was Thomas Gschladt, and he was an Austrian who became a friend of the Mozart family in Salzburg. Leopold Mozart was on the auditioners' commission when Gschladt came to audition for a job with the Archepiscopal court orchestra. In the course of the audition, Gschladt performed on no fewer than three instruments: trombone, trumpet, and violin, an unimaginable feat for a performer nowadays. Van Rijen only began to understand the true role of his instrument in early music when he started to perform chamber music of the baroque period. At the time, this was a relatively unexplored area of the brass repertoire. When he got to know the musicians of the Combattimento Consort Amsterdam, a plan was soon made to perform and record a CD with a selection this music. Van Rijen: To my surprise, I found that this gorgeous music for small ensembles from the seventeenth and eighteenth centuries actually used the trombone as a co-equal performer with the strings and continuo. The compositions were intended for performance as interludes between the sections of the Mass, and the composers often had backgrounds as violinists. This is also true of the sonatas that we selected for this CD. We have recorded works by violinist-composers Biagio Marini, Antonio Bertali, and Johann Heinrich Schmelzer. Dario Castello is the exception: he was a brass player. Why did those composers pick the trombone, of all instruments, for this purpose, rather than, say, the horn? One of the reasons was that the trombone was the only brass instrument of that period which was capable of playing a complete chromatic scale. In other words, the trombone could execute melodies and runs in the same way as a violin.
Around 1800, the newly-invented valves were added to trombones, horns, and trumpets. That made the chromatic scale possible for hornists and trumpeters as well, and it resulted in a kind of terrain shift. Later on, the trombone's role within classical music was primarily within the symphonic orchestra, where it was used for color and reinforcement. But in music of the baroque period for small ensembles, the trombone was making music together with the strings, as a soloist.

Le jeune Nerlandais, plein de talent!! (...) L'intonation est parfaite, le jeu est clair, prcis et sensible, les cadences sont d'une intelligence interprtative admirable. Ajoutons au plaisir de cd disque, celui d'une agrable surprise avec le compositeur italien Antonio Bertali: sa musique exubrante alterne entre danse populaire, rverie et mditation profonde. Mention spciale l'ensemble Combattimento Consort Amsterdam qui livre un enregistrement d'une lgance rare: les continuos habiles russissent le subtil et dlicat quilibre entre prsence et retenue dans l'accompagnement du soliste.
Classica Repertoire

(...) uitzonderlijk aangename muziek (...) (...) van Rijen bespeelt zijn oude trombones met verve en elegantie, haarzuiver en met perfecte trillers waar nodig.
Luister

I must say that this isn't the kind of CD which I thought would appeal to me. After all, what kind of pleasure can one derive from an hour's worth of 17th and 18th century trombone Concertos and chamber works? Well, quite a lot is the answer to that. This is a very interesting, and varied, programme and although most of the composers won't be known to you, don't let that put you off. As I often say, there's much to enjoy here. The recording is very crisp and clear and although the performers are situated quite close to the microphones, you can still feel the ambience of the Church where the recording was made.
Music Web International

(...) Glashelder vastgelegd, sprankelend begeleid door het Combattimento Consort van Jan Willen de Vriend. Een verrukkelijke uitgave die eindigt met een ware hit: een swingend perpetuum mobile dat gewoon staat geafficheerd als Sonate a tre van Antonio Bertali. Luister en geniet!
Klassieke Zaken

This is a superb album. Rijen's accounts of the well-known 18th-Century alto trombone concertos surpass anything I have heard, in both solo and orchestral parts. He is a world-class artist, and this album is a treasure.
American Record Guide

Meeslepend portret: (...) een nieuwe opname van Jrgen van Rijen, de onvolprezen solotrombonist van het Concertgebouworkest. Hij is graag van vele markten thuis en heeft een aantal historische trombones aangeschaft waarop hij met opmerkelijke souplesse en een prachtig ronde toon werken uit de 17e en 18e eeuw speelt. De concerten van Albrechtsberger, Leopold Mozart en Wagenseil klinken snoezig, maar enkele klein bezette werken van vroegbarokke meesters als Bertali, Castello en Schmelzer zijn minder conventioneel en daarom het spannendst. De violist Jan Willem de Vriend en diens Combattimento Consort bieden van Rijen levendig weerwerk. Telegraaf

(...) This Baroque instrument through its many iterations obviously did assimilate well the sweetness of the human voice with its soft tones and van Rijen makes his instruments sing with grace and lightness that is very pleasing to the ear. Highly recommended! 4 1/2 Stars, Audiophile Audition (...) Fans of the trombone will no doubt fined this of interest, but the music turns out to be far more worthwhile and rewarding than just a sackbut showcase.
Gramophone

(...) interessanter Musik darf man mit dieser Platte als auch erstklassige Musikerinnen und Musiker genieen.
Hessischer Rundfunk

(...) Was jedoch hier erklingt, ist in seiner Art ganz anders und lsst unwillkrlich aufhorchen, da man dem Zuginstrument Posaune eine solche Virtuositt kaum zutraut. Die gleichberechtigte Partnerschaft mit den Violinen, der Vortrag von Passagen in musikalischer Wechselrede, die spielerische Ausfhrung von Verzierungen, die musikalische Wendigkeit in der Darstellung der hufig wechselnden Metrik und die farbige Ausstaffierung mit unterschiedlichen Besetzungen des Basso continuo-Parts (so etwa auch mit Fagott in Schmelzers Sonata 3') machen die kurzen Werke zu einem wahren Hr-Abenteuer.
Klassik.com

(...) This is a superb album. Rijen's accounts of the well-known 18th-Century alto trombone concertos surpass anything I have heard, in both solo and orchestral parts () () He is a world-class artist, and this album is a treasure.
Kilpatrick

Knap zoals hij, optimaal mengend met het orkestspel, zijn instrument laat zingen in fraai legato en daarmee soms de illusie van hoornklanken wekt. Virtuoze stukjes muziek.
Gelderlander