On the Road: Tempesta di Mare at the Frick (New York début)

“Amid the graciousness-from-centuries-past environs of the Frick Collection on the Upper East Side, Philadelphia baroque music group Tempesta di Mare was having its New York debut Sunday in a prestigious, mainstream concert series, and playing in top form. It was time. Individual members surface periodically in early-music concerts and even opera productions here. Also, Time Out New Yorkhas been extravagantly receptive to Tempesta recordings. Co-founders Gwyn Roberts (recorder and flute) and Richard Stone (theorbo and archlute) weren’t above showing off their technical prowess on Sunday. And why not? I’d forgotten just how good they are. The Sunday program of Handel and Vivaldi represented, to these ears, such a consolidation in terms of what was played and the level at which it was played that future performances (most immediately, Handel’s Aci, Galatea & Polifemo May 15-16 in Philadelphia) can only benefit. Elsewhere, the program had strong compositional personalities such as Barbara Strozzi, represented by L’Amante segreto, and the short Handel cantata ‘Menzognere speranze,’ a 1707 piece that gives credence to the opinion that Handel’s Rome period was his best. Soprano Clara Rottsolk isn’t the typical early-music singer; her opulent tone can overwhelm a good, intricate trill. But is that so important when every phrase has such a communicative emotional presence? In the full auditorium (which is round, with fabric-covered walls), the seemingly non-specialist audience seemed perfectly happy with what it heard — as well it should’ve been.”Philadelphia Inquirer, April 2009.