Sonata for recorder

Very little is known about Giovanni Battista Fontana (ca. 1580-1630). The few biographical data we have derive from a 1641 Venetian publication of his sonatas for solo instrument with continuo. This one publication offers a critical glimpse at the Italian solo sonata in its infancy. It also amply demonstrates Fontana’s mastery and ingenuity in instrumental composition. Sonata No. 2 starts with a slow section, followed by a change to faster tempo. Fontana uses both tempo and meter (duple vs. triple) much as his contemporary organists did in their ricercars and fantasias. From this practice would emerge the idiomatic slow-fast-slow-fast pattern of the mature sonata di chiesa (i.e., “church sonata,” compared to chamber sonatas that had many dance movements). But in 1640 such consistency still lay fifty years in the future. For Fontana there exists no convention in either number of tempo of alternating sections. Instead, he revels in brilliant figuration no matter the tempo.

(c) Jason Stell