There are now so many recordings of Vivaldi's The Four Seasons that it must be almost impossible for violinists to add a distinctive interpretation. Luka Faulisi also felt this hot breath on his neck when he and Martyna Pastuszka, conductor of the {oh!} Orkiestra, began working on the concept of this album. Distinctive this album certainly is. In their own words, the album was to be a kind of
… "quasi-cinematographic" interpretation of Vivaldi's music. In fact, Vivaldi based his violin concertos related to the four seasons on presumably self-written sonnets. The atmospheres, colors and sounds in those poems found their way into the violin concertos. Faulisi and consorts put their full effort into this, playing to their hearts' content with the sound imitations of birds, storms and thunderstorms. Especially the storm scene in the final movement of The Summer sounds almost like heavy metal on baroque instruments. The intensity of Vivaldi's music is given a serene counterpart on the album in three other nature-based pieces by Tchaikovsky, Lili Boulanger and the Italian folk song O cant dels ocells (in Pablo Casals' version). Indeed an album to let the music of Vivaldi pass by like a soundtrack. You have to think of the images to go with it. (JWvR)more
