Carlo d'Ordoñez / Sinfonia in C major, Brown C:10 revised video

A volume in the ongoing series publishing the sinfonias of Ordoñez in new urtext editions by http://www.primalamusica.com published by Brian Clark. The audio was generated via Sibelius Ultimate. Many thanks to Brian Clark and Max Sobel for suggestions with this edition. This is the first movement only. And the repeats are not performed.

Many thanks to Vitor Junqueira of Portugal for permission to use his photograph. Please see his other work online @ https://www.flickr.com/people/vitorjk/

This is a highly unusual symphony, mostly because of its opulent scoring. It requires two choirs of trumpets and timpani (two trumpets and timpani in each choir), in addition to 2 flutes, 2 oboes, 2 horns, with a delightful middle movement for oboe solo. There was a strong Austrian tradition in the 18th century for C major trumpet / timpani pieces for either church use or even in secular settings, dating back to the baroque. This is the only known post baroque symphony that requires such large forces. A music catalog first lists this piece in 1775, so it had to have been composed prior to that date. This sinfonia was singled out by Haydn scholar H.C. Robbins-Landon as being quite remarkable; and other musicologists have drawn attention to Ordoñez's influence on Mozart, particularly in Symphony 41 in C Major. Ordonez was one of a number of composers working in Vienna during the second half of the eighteenth century. Ordonez was not a full-time professional musician. Most of his working life was spent in the employment of the Lower Austrian Regional Court and his musical activities were pursued in his spare time. Ordonez's choice of career was probably dictated by his social rank. As a member of the nobility, albeit of the lowest rank, he would have been aware that a professional musical career would not have befitted a man of his social standing.

Ordonez's professional activities included membership of two prestigious performing bodies: the k.k. Hofund Kammermusik (where he was employed as a Kammermusikus) and the Tonkünstler-Societät in which he was active both as a violinist and as a composer. Ordonez was an early member of the Tonkuenstler-Societaet, an organization devoted to raising money through public concerts for the widows and orphans of musicians, and maintained a close association from 1771, the year of its foundation, until 1784. Ordonez also performed regularly in the houses of the nobility. Dr Charles Burney heard him play at a musical dinner party in 1772 held in the residence of the British Ambassador in Vienna, Lord Stormont.

Ill health forced Ordonez to resign both his professional playing appointments in 1783. The same year he was forced to retire on half-salary from his position with the Lower Austrian Land Court, a circumstance which caused him great financial distress. The last three years of Ordonez's life were spent in sickness and poverty. At the time of his death from pulmonary tuberculosis, Ordonez was living a hand-to-mouth existence in shared lodgings. He possessed only a few items of clothing and his total estate, including outstanding pension payments, was valued at less than the cost of his funeral. The outstanding balance was paid by his son-in-law, Joseph Niedlinger, a minor government official in the Upper Building Management Division of the court.

For a part-time composer Ordonez was a surprisingly prolific. In addition to his two operatic works - a marionette opera, Musica della Parodie d'Alceste and a Singspiel, Diesmal hat der Mann den Willen - Ordonez is known to have composed a significant amount of church music (now lost), a secular cantata, 73 symphonies, a violin concerto and a large corpus of chamber music of which the 27 authenticated string quartets are of particular importance. Ordonez's sophisticated experiments with cyclic unity and his liking for contrapuntal textures gives his much of his music a very distinctive and original quality. His symphonies were widely disseminated in manuscript copies and Abbé Stadler noted that they "received great applause". In particular his opus 1 string quartets are credited as containing "some of the most sophisticated pre-19th-century techniques of cyclic unification.

Sinfonia in C for 2 choirs of 2 trumpets, and timpani, 2 oboes, 2 horns, and 2 flutes, 2 violins, viola, and continuo.


[1.] Allegro in tempo comodo 3/4 00:01