Anneke Uittenbosch was a student of Gustav Leonhardt and on this Peter Philips recording she manifests a similar sense of seriousness and expressive control. She has a knack for doing what people used to say Klemperer did, she gives the music a coherent palpable architecture, so that transitions seem natural, dénouements seem inevitable, endings sound final. The readings are very imaginative, in that we find a Philips much more meditative than elsewhere. Her performances are profound, in that they dig into the music inner voices, so that the textures are contrapuntally complex, she makes the music work more through this counterpoint rather than through lyricism. The final pieces, the Passamezzo Pavan and Galliard and the F major fantasie are real high points of Philips on record, if not English renaissance keyboard on record. The Galiard is especially impressive.
Maybe we have something really revealing in her interpretations because it makes Philips sound very close in style to Sweelinck. I mean I know that Sweelinck liked and used some of Philips tunes, but with Uittenbosch you can hear that the influence goes further - and has much to do with counterpoint.
Uittenbosch is my sort of musician.
But I have a slight personal reservation. She uses two instruments, and one of them is a modern copy of a Flemish harpsichord “à grand ravalement” and I’m not so keen on its very rich sound. Having said that, it is colourful and saves some of the music from slipping into over-austerity.
