‘The greatest harmonist in Italy, that is to say in the world’, wrote Jean-Jacques Rousseau of Francesco Durante in his Dictionnaire of 1768. This is most certainly hyperbole, as to my ears there is little extraordinary here in terms of harmonic exploration. Perhaps Rousseau was speaking more of Durante’s thorough and rigorous abilities as a teacher of harmony. Durante served as maestro di cappella at the Conservatorio dei Poveri di Gesù Cristo in Naples; he also taught at the Conservatorio di S Maria di Loreto (succeeding Nicola Porpora as head of the institution) and the famous Conservatorio of S Onofrio. Stylistically speaking, certainly, his music has a pedagogical emphasis, though the counterpoint is not always successfully married to musical flair. Take the three-part canon that closes the Concerto No 6 in A: there is a sense in which the music desperately tries to be joyful, at least in gesture and rhetoric, but the counterpoint hinders any kind of dramatic progress or genuine exuberance of character.

More than occasionally Durante veers towards the strange, of which the opening movement of the Concerto No 8 in A is the most obvious example. It is series of nine (!) changing scenes, each conjuring a different mood or character: something like CPE Bach’s trio sonata ‘Sanguineus and Melancholicus’, but here Durante is evoking not a conversation between multiple people of differing humoral dispositions but madness, giving the concerto its title, La pazzia.

The performances themselves are interesting. The Accademia dell’Annunciata perform with an undeniable warmth, and often this approaches a very attractive benevolence: special mention goes to viola player Archimede De Martini, whose solos throughout are particularly lovely. Director Riccardo Doni has excellent control over tempos. But there is nothing here that thoroughly captures my imagination or attention. The level of ensemble-playing is also not entirely persuasive. Section-playing could be far more together and distributed in agency (the sound too often comes from ‘the front’). A more cohesive violin-section sound in the Largo from the Concerto No 4 in E minor, for example, would surely elevate this performance to lusciousness.

For an album that seeks to highlight the music of Durante, I awkwardly suggest that there is too much Durante on offer here. Situating his music more clearly within the Neapolitan tradition might highlight his unique qualities. And though we have a cello concerto by Porpora (perhaps the most thrilling performance here) and a concerto by Nicola Fiorenza (now how’s that for lush harmonic exploration? What wonderful dissonances!), this could be better organised to help the Durante enunciate itself a bit better.