Purcell: Ten Sonatas in Four Parts - Classic FM Magazine

Fiddlers Matthew Truscott and Sophie Gent, bass viol Jonathan Manson and harpsichordist Matthew Halls are the group ‘formerly known as the King's Consort'. A tragic mood pervades the disc. The first sonata shares an almost identical first chord with that of Purcell's opera Dido and Aeneas. The ornaments slither dangerously and the dances tread with guilty lightness. The highpoint is Sonata No.6, a long, single-movement adagio consisting of fiddles intertwining with ever-increasing invention above an untiring ground bass.