Boccherini: String & Guitar Quintets & Minuet in A [the famous minuet]

EDITOR'S CHOICE - Gramophone Magazine June 2001

"Refreshingly, the programme is drawn from the composer's most experimental works...and is delivered not just with percussion, but also with fire, enthusiasm and wit" BBC Music

"Enchanting chamber music by this 18th century master performed with an ideal light touch by the ever-stylish Europa Galante" (Gramophone)

Fabio Biondi is joined by just four members of Europa Galante in the group's first chamber disc for Virgin Classics: three string quintets with two cellos by Luigi Boccherini. Chamber music was central to Boccherini's output and during his nine years as composer to the Infante Don Luis of Spain he poured out a steady stream of works whose melodic and harmonic inventiveness led him to be placed second only to Haydn as an instrumental composer by his contemporaries. The 'famous Minuet' is from the Quintet Op.11 No.5 but has long had an independent life typifying the graceful charm of much of Boccherini's music.

Europa Galante: 'A brilliant baroque ensemble, combining great virtuosity with idiomatic expression.' Classic CD