Froberger: Suites for Harpsichord, volume 3

English harpsichordist Gilbert Rowland has completed the third volume in his ongoing series of the complete Suites for Harpsichord by Johann Jakob Froberger. The album was recorded at Holy Trinity Church, Weston, Hertfordshire on 11-14 July 2022, with engineer John Taylor who produced all of Gilbert’s previous Divine Art and Athene recordings. The first two volumes of the series had attracted much praise from critics for its “glorious sound” and “energy and a good forward drive” of Rowland’s playing.

Johann Jakob Froberger was a highly accomplished composer of the middle Baroque period and credited with inventing the ‘baroque suite’ used with variations by Bach, Handel and countless other composers. He was extremely prolific and several of his works, including many of the Harpsichord Suites, have been discovered recently.

Gilbert Rowland first studied the harpsichord with Millicent Silver and made his debut at Fenton House in 1970 and first appeared at the Wigmore Hall in 1973. He made numerous recordings of works by Scarlatti, Soler, Rameau and Fischer which received considerable acclaim from the national press. He joined Divine Art in 2010 to record the harpsichord suites by Handel, followed by those of Froberger and Mattheson and was assigned to Divine Art’s specialist early music label, Athene.