Echo.

The fourth Brandenburg Concerto is scored for violin, 2 flutes, strings, and continuo. Bach’s Previewscore calls the flutes “fiauti d’echo,” an unusual term which probably indicates that a recorder in F was intended. But does “d’echo” mean more than simply specifying which recorders were to be used? If indeed recorders, rather than the transverse flute, then one might presume that the softer sound of the recorder is intended as a sort of echo—except for the fact that the flutes appear from the start of the Fourth Brandenburg, even without the solo violin, and while they occasionally double the solo violin, they are rarely used in an echo function. They do occasionally “echo” each other, especially in the second movement, but one wonders whether Bach really thought of these repeated “echoes” as softer echoes, or merely as imitative passages, which we find so often in Baroque music.

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Because it features the recorder and the fiddle, the fourth concerto of Bach's Brandenburgs has always been my favorite. Being a huge fan of early music has caused me to have a love-hate relationship with Baroque music ... it's the incessant banging and clanging of the harpsichord (sorry, WFB).

In their treatment of the piece, Rinaldo Allessandrini and Concerto Italiano the problem is quietly solved. This is fantastic.