Garden of Early Delights - Pamela Thorby & Andrew Lawrence-King - Early Music Review

The subtitle of this CD, ‘A mixed bouquet of diverse, joyous, unusual and eloquent pieces from the renaissance and early baroque periods', gives a good idea of what you can expect. These are sparkling and fresh performances of mostly well-known pieces, and you are sure to enjoy Pamela Thorby's seemingly effortless playing of the glosas, passaggi and other embellishments on Ganassi-style recorders, as well as the more expressive pieces, some for baroque triple harp alone. The use of the harp, and once the psaltery, gives an added dimension to the Van Eyck pieces, though it does perhaps slightly obscure some of the rapid diminutions on War zal men op den Avond doen. That is my only quibble, however. This is a most interesting and enjoyable collection, and the Super Audio CD recording is complemented by some really excellent notes in the booklet.