Two newly identified violin sonatas

It is not often that previously unknown instrumental compositions by Albinoni (1671–1751) turn up, but Michael Talbot recently found two violin sonatas – one from the very start of his career and the other from the period of his maturity – among the anonymous manuscripts of the Este Collection in the Austrian National Library. Both sonatas originate from the collection of Niccolò Sanguinazzo, an amateur musician resident in Padua, and one of them may well have been written for the court of Mantua. Talbot’s attribution of the sonatas to Albinoni, which draws on his very extensive knowledge of this highly individual composer, is based on contextual, structural and stylistic criteria. The probably earlier work, in G minor, is similar in character to some four-part balletti in the same collection and is particularly interesting for some cantata-like features in its opening movement. The other sonata, in B flat major and resembling the works published in Albinoni’s Op. 6 (1712), is noteworthy for the finely chiselled melodic lines of its slow movements and sparkling passage-work in the quick ones. Both sonatas are attractive additions to the Albinonian canon.