The key to Buxtehude’s trio sonatas, both for performers and for listeners, is an awareness of the stylus fantasticus which German composers of the late 17th and early 18th centuries developed in response to the new freely inventive style of Italian composers such as Claudio Merulo and Girolamo Frescobaldi. ‘It is the most free and unrestrained method of composing,’ wrote one contemporary theorist. ‘It is bound to nothing, neither to any words nor to a melodic subject, instituted to display genius and to teach the hidden design of harmony and the ingenious composition of harmonic phrases and fugues.’

The seven sonatas in each of these collections, published in Hamburg in 1696, offer a continuous succession of short movements, up to eight per sonata, which alternate between slow and fast tempi, and improvisatory and contrapuntal textures, dominated by a dazzling array of ostinato variations which embed the melodies in the listener’s consciousness. We encounter witty solos, dialogues and conversations, sublime suspensions, jaunty syncopations and occasional excursions into strange and modal harmony. The expressive range is accordingly wide, venturing in Op.1 no.6 into a D minor realm of darkness and desperation.

The musicians on this new recording of Buxtehude’s trio sonatas are experienced and skilful practitioners of Baroque style, with an impressive catalogue of albums on Brilliant Classics to their credit. Valerio Losito has recorded the violin sonatas of Scarlatti, Telemann and Tessarini, among others, while Simone Stella has made complete surveys of the organ and harpsichord output by Froberger and Pachelbel – ‘performed with natural flair, especially with respect to clarifying counterpoint’ (Gramophone).

Simone Stella introduces these fascinating works, milestones in the history of German-Baroque chamber music, with an extensive booklet essay. This is ‘music full of lyrically delicate, sorrowful, and dramatic emotions,’ he says, ‘as well as melodious, harmonically gratifying, and full of vitality, a world of sound that consecrates him as a unique genius in the Pantheon of Music.’