Categories
Recording

Lully: L’Idylle sure la Paix, Charpentier: La Fête de Rueil

CD cover Lully Idylle Charpentier Fête BEMF

Boston Early Music Vocal & Chamber Ensembles, directed by Paul O’Dette & Stephen Stubbs
75:50
cpo 555678-2

During the 17th and 18th centuries, it was customary to celebrate a major peace treaty or important victory with both sacred and secular music, in the case of the former a Te Deum, often freshly composed. Meanwhile, poets and composers would occupy themselves producing an ode in praise of the victor, or less frequently, a dramatic work crafted for the occasion. The present disc presents secular works from both these categories by the leading French composers of the 17th century, Jean-Baptiste Lully and Marc-Antoine Charpentier. Both were written to celebrate the same event, the Truce of Ratisbon (or Regensburg), which brought an end to the war Louis XIV had fought against the Holy Roman Empire and Spain. Signed in 1684, the Truce initiated what would be a short-lived period of peace that would be widely celebrated in a France increasingly wearied by Louis’s military exploits.

Such occasional works by their very nature present difficulties for modern performers and audiences. Laudatory and often sycophantic in the extreme, there is often little literary interest or emotional content to grasp. Lully’s Idylle sur la Paix is in this respect rather different in that it has a text written by no less than Jean Racine, which if not major Racine is by definition superior to the dozens of such texts churned out by hacks. The occasion of the lavish first performance of the Idylle was a fête attended by the king and his court and given by the Marquis de Seigneley in the orangery at his château at Sceaux, near Versailles in July 1685. Contemporary accounts – several quoted in Gilbert Blin’s long historical note in the booklet – testify to the glittering grandiosity of the occasion. What is not clear is the kind of forces likely to have been employed, but it seems unlikely it would have been the small chamber music ensemble employed in this new cpo. The recording is based on performances originally given by the Boston Early Music Festival in 2022 and subsequently recorded in Bremen. The Idylle consists of a sequence of brief airs and récitatives alternated with the odd ensemble number, choruses and dances, both the latter at times employed as ritornelli. Probably at least in part due to the reason given at the outset of this paragraph, the performances do little to present the work in a positive light, being vocally largely uninteresting and not helped by poor diction. But what really finishes them off is a familiar complaint against Boston Festival performances: the incessant, intolerable and a-historical continuo strumming on theorbo and – even worse – Baroque guitar by Boston’s joint directors, Paul O’Dette and Stephen Stubbs. Both are outstanding players – I count O’Dette’s set of the complete Dowland lute works to be one of the treasures of my collection – but their persistent intrusive contributions to Boston Festival recordings is highly regrettable.

It goes without saying that the same caveat applies to Charpentier’s La Fête de Rueil, but here the presence of a dramatic context does seem to have helped the singers to a higher level of communication and better, though not perfect, diction. The work takes its name from the château built by the statesman Cardinal Richelieu at a small town on the outskirts of Paris. According to Blin, the work was commissioned by Richelieu, who celebrated his 100th birthday this same year, but no contemporary performance of it has been recorded, which is extremely odd if it was indeed commissioned. That it was intended for Richelieu is not in doubt, since the anonymous text mentions his name twice. Catherine Cessac, Charpentier’s biographer, is more circumspect, suggesting only that it ‘may have been performed at Rueil’. Cessac also points to the work being planned on a ‘lavish scale’, for six solo voices, a four-part choir, and a sizable orchestra that includes a continuo section composed of bass violins, bassoons and harpsichord (NB – no mention of lutes of any kind). La Fête de Rueil is a staged dramatic pastorale featuring shepherds, among them a pair of reluctant lovers, Pan, and, incongruously, an ‘Egyptian Woman’, a fortune teller. The work certainly here makes a greater impression than the Lully, with some attractive singing from tenor Aaron Sheehan (Tirsi) and Danielle Reutter-Harrah (Iris), the possessor of a pure, youthful-sounding soprano.

In truth, neither of these occasional pieces adds anything significant to our understanding of its respective composer, but those tempted to explore the CD will need to go online to see the libretto, it seemingly having become cpo’s policy not to include texts in its booklets.

Brian Robins

Categories
Festival-conference

Ambronay Festival 2025

Ensemble Correspondances directed by Sébastien Daucé in Bach cantatas, Ambronay Festival 2025. © Bertrand Pichène
Ensemble Correspondances directed by Sébastien Daucé in Bach cantatas, Ambronay Festival 2025. © Bertrand Pichène

Over the years, the special event that is the Ambronay Festival has formed an important part of my musical life, something I attempted to articulate in a special article for EMR on the occasion of the 40th edition of the festival in 2019.

Since then, for a variety of reasons, my visits to Ambronay came to a halt until this year. During that time, some things have inevitably changed, not least that what was a five-weekend event in September and early October has shrunk to three weekends. Perhaps that may be an indication that even in France, where regional arts funding has traditionally been far more generous than it is in the UK, the belt has predictably tightened. More importantly, the ambiance and aims have not changed, there being still a friendly local feel to the event, with the village of Ambronay fully involved in the festival and its complementary events. Perhaps most importantly of all, the festival, the hub of which remains the 11th-century Benedictine abbey, continues to provide a range of music making, much of it involving international artists, that includes an extensive range of repertoire. My choice this year fell on the second weekend (19 to 21 September), during which it was possible to hear a programme that included early Bach cantatas, a concert performance of Handel’s Acis and Galatea (for which you’ll have to go to Opera magazine to see the review), a programme featuring Palestrina and Victoria, a concert for the unusual combination of harp and lute, and a concluding programme of 17th-century operatic and vocal music that turned out to be more an ‘event’ than a concert.

The Bach concert on the evening of the 19th, as with all events unless otherwise mentioned, took place in the splendid acoustic of the Abbatiale (abbey church). It consisted of three well-known early cantatas, BWV 131, ‘Aus der Tiefe’ (1707-8), one of Bach’s earliest surviving cantatas, BWV 106, ‘Gottes Zeit ist die allerbeste Zeit’ (Actus tragicus, ?1707) and BWV 4, ‘Christ lag in Todesbanden’ (date unknown), the last-named variations on a hymn of Luther’s and one of Bach’s rare extant Easter works. All three conform to 17th-century tradition rather than the modern alternation of recitative and aria, with a freedom of form and chorales at times tellingly superimposed on arias. Those familiar with my views will be aware that on the great Bach controversy of our day they are firmly sited in the one-voice-per-part camp, which is what I expected from Sébastien Daucé and his outstanding Ensemble Correspondances. Not so. Daucé employed a small choir of three per part (four in the case of sopranos), including soloists, though far from inflexibly, with, for example, OVPP for the chorale interjections of BWV 131 in the exquisite tenor aria, ‘Meine seele’, shaped with tender affection by Florian Sievers. All the performances here were in fact notable for their combination of an inwardly expressive and contemplative feel and moments of vitality, the final chorale of BWV 4 completing the concert in playful spirit. Well, not quite completing since Daucé gave us an encore in the shape of a final chorus from BWV 150, ‘Nach dir, Herr’, another early cantata, possibly from the Weimar years. That did bring to an end an immensely satisfying evening that others will also soon be able to enjoy, the programme being shortly due for release on CD.

The programme the following afternoon was given by the Spanish vocal ensemble Cantoría, winners of the eeEmerging audience prize at Ambronay in 2018. Since then, Cantoría has grown exponentially both in reputation and numbers, for this year’s appearance fielding an ensemble of thirteen singers in a well-devised programme that embedded Paletrina’s Missa Papae Marcelli with motets by Victoria. I write well-devised since it threw into sharp relief the raison-d’être of the Palestrina, famously composed by the great polyphonist seemingly to answer complaints that the text of the liturgy was being obscured by contrapuntal complexity. Here Victoria’s eight-voice ‘Ave regina caelorum’ soon produced a note in my programme to the effect that while the balance between the voices was good there was little evidence of textural clarity or projection, a situation that changed with the Kyrie and – to an even greater degree – with the Gloria of the Palestrina, the latter’s largely homophonic textures allowing such moments as ‘Qui tollis’ to make their proper effect. The succeeding eight-voice ‘Alma redemptoris’ brought a return to polyphonic splendour, climaxing in a perfectly chorded peroration. Linked by brief organ passages or plainchant, the programme thus proceeded in an unbroken sequence to form a satisfying non-liturgical concert. Although ending with Victoria’s eight-part Ave Maria, it really culminated in a radiantly lovely Agnus Dei, notable for its central section being scored in seven parts rather than the six parts of the remainder of the Mass.

There were three concerts during the course of Sunday. I missed that in the morning, leaving it to the rather younger audience at whom it was aimed, but in the afternoon attended that by Les Accords Nouveaux entitled “L’Art de cour et de Salon – Autriche.” Given in the more intimate Salle Monteverdi by harpist Pernelle Marzorati and lutenist Thomas Vincent, it consisted of a selection of largely inconsequential Rococo salon pieces by composers such as Joseph Haydn, Adam Falckenhagen (1697-1754) and J-B Krumpholz (1742-1790). Despite falling innocuously on the ear, being presented with great charm and receiving some outstanding playing – Marzorati in particular is an excellent musician whose playing gave the music an undeserved point and poise – this really is not concert repertoire to present to an audience sitting silently in serried ranks.


If that afternoon recital may have moments that induced thoughts of the foregone afternoon nap, there was never a chance of that in the final concert. Entitled “Le Donne di Cavalli”, it was given by the soprano Mariana Flores with support from Cappella Mediterranea under their director Leonardo García-Alarcón, also the director of the previous night’s Acis and Galatea. Although the texts of the programme were printed, the sequence as performed had little relationship to it. Not, I suspect, that made much difference to this whirlwind of a concert, which, given Alarcón’s propensity for inflating instrumental support, was in that sense only decidedly on the modest, continuo-biased side. Dressed in a tight glittering dress more redolent of a night on a Hollywood red carpet, Flores’s performances of extracts from operas by Cavalli, and songs by Antonia Bemba (1640-1720) and Barbara Strozzi (1619-1677) seethed with passionate emotion and dramatic intensity in a way that seemed to have its own integrity. There is indeed much pure beauty in the voice, as was demonstrated perhaps above all in Strozzi’s ‘Lagrime mie’, a miniature drama in its own right strategically placed at the heart of the programme. Here, extraordinarily powerful vocal outpourings vied with passages of exquisitely drawn mezza voce singing of great delicacy, words, clearly articulated, tumbled out unstoppably or were lovingly caressed. This remarkable, at times arguably a little ‘over the top’, concert was thus indeed better seen as an ‘event’. Certainly, the Ambronay audience loved it, and it was the kind of thing that I strongly suspect could bring new audiences to the repertoire.

Brian Robins

Categories
Recording

Beethoven: Complete Violin Sonatas

CD cover Beethoven Violin Sonatas Sato Chai

Shunske Sato violin, Shuann Chai fortepiano
236:02 (3 CDs)
Cobra 0094

If the ten sonatas Beethoven composed for piano and violin over a period of a little over a decade hardly have the significance of his string quartets, that is at least in part due to the genre itself. Traditionally, the violin sonata was fundamentally piano repertoire for ladies – let’s not forget they were invariably written for ‘piano and violin’, not the other way round. She would most likely play them with a male partner, perhaps the lady’s teacher. The ‘violin sonata’ thus remained largely the province of the amateur. Until Beethoven, that is. Already in the first group, the three sonatas of op 12, published in 1799 with a dedication to the composer’s teacher Antonio Salieri, there was sufficient difference for critical comment to note that they are ‘strange sonatas, overloaded with difficulties’. The following sonatas, in A minor, op 23 and F, op 24 (‘Spring’), dating from 1800/1801 were both dedicated to the wealthy young nobleman and arts patron Count Moritz von Fries, the latter of course having taken its place as one of Beethoven’s best-loved violin sonatas.

In retrospect, we can see this period as one in which Beethoven devoted particular energy to the composition of the violin sonata, all with one exception, op 96 in G of 1812, dating from a short period during 1802 and 1803. They include the three sonatas of op 30, the odd story of whose dedication to Tsar Alexander I – Beethoven never had any personal connection with him – is related in the excellent booklet note. Then there is of course the Sonata in A, op 47, generally known as ‘Kreutzer’ after its eventual dedicatee, the French violinist Rodolphe Kreutzer, the work also having a background story that does little credit to Beethoven. There are therefore no ‘late’ violin sonatas, but equally no place for pleasing music designed for young ladies, rather music designed to solicit patronage or, in the case of those of op 30, a declared intent to ‘strike out on a new path’.

The present integral set of performances is important because, like the cycle of the string quartets recently recorded by the Narratio Quartet, they reflect the new wave of interest in finding ways of conveying means of expressivity by employing technical devices known to have been in use in Beethoven’s day. These include particularly rubato and portamento, the first of which can if used with musical intelligence create an agreeable impression of improvisation, while the second, the ‘sliding’ from one note to another, is capable if employed with sensitivity of enhancing expression, though carrying with it the risk of sounding vulgar. Both can be heard used extensively though not thoughtlessly by the Japanese husband-and-wife team Shunska Sato and Shuann Chai, the latter playing on two Viennese fortepianos by Michael Rosenberger, one dating from 1800, used for all the sonatas with the exception op 96, for which Chai turns to an instrument built twenty years later. The earlier instrument is a delight, with a timbre ranging from full and powerful to the captivating sweet mellowness heard in the opening movement of the ‘Spring’ Sonata, a movement that also admirably captures the fluency of Chai’s playing. Sato’s tone is in general fine too, though just occasionally it can sound a little sour, at least as recorded, particularly in portamentos, which are broadly used with discretion, though there are inevitably times when the listener may feel they are being over- (or under-) used. An example of overuse for me would be the second, Adagio expressive movement of Sonata 10 in G, where the warm middle range of the fortepiano envelops the music in a rhapsodic dream perhaps slightly disturbed by an excess of portamenti. Elsewhere, one of the great charms of the performances is the light and often witty approach. I’ll choose as an example the first of the variations of the Kreutzer Sonata’s second movement. Here, the delicate butterfly flutterings of the fortepiano are exquisitely complemented by the violin’s delicate little interactions to form an enchanting Japanese tapestry.

It would be possible but probably tedious to continue enumerating many small points, but I do hope readers with a sense of enquiry will explore these vital and probing performances. They seem to me a part of a definite, but as yet largely unrecognised, and wider movement to re-examine the whole question of rhetorical expression and the release of emotion in music of the 18th and early 19th centuries.

Brian Robins

Categories
Recording

Love’s Labyrinth

CD cover Love's Labyrinth Gonzaga Band Savan Newton Devine

Songs and Duets of Monteverdi and his Contemporaries
The Gonzaga Band (Faye Newton, Jamie Savan, Steven Devine)
deux-elles DXL1213
65:45

With the five-star artists of Jamie Savan’s Gonzaga Band, we know that the artistry of the players, their long history of working together in such small-scale projects and Savan’s meticulous scholarship in editing material will produce a programme that offers fine music in captivating performances.

To appreciate the interlaced threads that make up such a well-researched programme, you need to read Savan’s liner notes: these ten columns are a model for how to coax listeners into believing that they understand the nuances behind the choice of some obscure treasures, and to believe that we have been party to the way in which these pearls have been selected and strung together.

They perform this programme at A=440, and the keyboard instruments are tuned in ¼ comma mean tone. They include a harpsichord by Dennis Woolley after an original by Hieronymus Bononiensis (Rome 1521) in the V & A, a single-strung harpsichord by Colin Booth after a 1533 instrument by Domenico da Pesaro in Leipzig and an ottavino of his after a 17th-century original in the Kunsthistorisches Museum in Vienna. The organ is a digitally sampled keyboard after the Goetze and Gwynne St Teilo Tudor Organ.

Faye Newton has a beguiling voice: clear as a bell, yet delivered with a technical mastery that makes her the ideal singer for this Italian repertoire that spans the cusp of the 16th to 17th centuries. Her neat Italian diction coveys the changing emotions of the poems perfectly and the choice and arrangement of material, ranging from solo songs through duets to four- and five-voice madrigals, explores every possible combination of instruments, and, as with the Gonzaga Band’s other programmes, we are left marvelling at how so much rich music can be contrived with such minimal resources. As Savan’s note suggests, ‘If Monteverdi’s five-voice madrigals were performed in the context of the musica secreta in the 1590s, with its emphasis on female vocal virtuosity, they would likely have been so in some kind of arrangement for upper voices with keyboards, as exemplified by Luzzaschi.’

This is a delightful programme, and a very good introduction to the power of song as it was being rediscovered in those formative years for modern music.

David Stancliffe

Categories
Recording

Bach: Les 18 chorals de Leipzig & Variations Canoniques

CD cover Bach Les 18 chorals Martin Gester

Martin Gester organ
109:18 (2 CDs in a card triptych)
Paraty 2025005

This admirable recording was made in October 2024 on an organ built in 2023 within a surviving 18th-century case at St Loup in Namur. The aim was to recreate within the existing rather French-style case an instrument that reflected rather the sound of more central Germany in the mid-18th century. So, unlike the recordings on surviving instruments from the late 17th and early 18th centuries in the north German style made in the 1950s and 60s by organists like Helmut Walcha which have so coloured the way in which Bach’s organ music has been received, here is a recording of two of the great summary collections of Bach’s later years played on the kind of instrument with which Bach would have been more familiar rather than the more severely north German/Dutch instruments by Schnitger with which composers like Buxtehude would have played.

The organ chosen for this recording is by Dominique Thomas, the builders of the substantial 2008 organ in the Temple du Bouclier in Strasbourg, with which Martin Gester is clearly familiar, and there is a wealth of information on the Namur organ – though alas no detailed registration scheme piece by piece. The organ is pitched at Chörton (A465), and tuned in a modified Neidhardt 1724 temperament.

Accompanying Gester’s rhythmically fluid playing, perhaps appreciated best in Allein Gott in der Hoh sei Herr BWV 663 with the cantus firmus in the Soprano (2.1), is a great variety of registration. Ornamented chorales in the right hand are often played on a Sesquialtera or Cornet, sometimes on a reed, and occasionally on an 8’ Principal, as in BWV 959. In An Wasserflüssen Babylon (BWV 653) the Chorale is played in the style of a Chromhorne en Taille. There is liberal use of a tremulant, even with an 8’ Principal, as in the first verse of O Lamm Gottes, unschuldig (BWV 656); I was unprepared for the second verse to be played on the Vox Humana complete with tremulant! This substantial prelude, lasting over 8 minutes, is one of Bach’s most astonishing compositions. When the chorale is given to the Pedal, reeds at several pitches are employed and a pedal bass at 8’pitch – there are no less than four 8’ flue ranks on the pedal organ – is used effectively in a number of the trio movements, like BWV 664, the trio on Allein Gott in der Hoh sei Ehr (2.3), as well as in BWV 663. For Gester’s notes, you need to consult his detailed blog, which will lead you to his reflections on the desert island quality of this miscellaneous collection (so unlike other collections like the well-planned but incomplete Orgelbüchlein) as well as the full texts of the chorales on which the preludes are based, which is highly illuminating for his interpretations.

For the larger Organo Pleno registrations, the instrument provides a variety of options, and Gester does not hesitate to use manual 16’ ranks. In the trio on Nun Komm’, der Heiden Heiland (BWV 661), the ornamented chorale is accompanied by a bicinium of bass parts in close imitation not unlike some of the duets in cantatas for a bass voice and basso continuo, and here the manual left hand betrays traces of a cantata adaptation with its viola da gamba-like chords at cadences that link it stylistically to the Schübler Chorales.

The obvious comparison to this performance is that by James Johnstone, who played “The Eighteen” with the canonic variations on Von Himmel hoch (BWV 769) on the Treutmann Organ of 1737 in Grauhof, which I reviewed in April 2021. I find Gester’s performance to be as well-judged as Johnstone’s, and I learned much from it – not least how important the chorale settings are in the cantatas and how closely interrelated are the cantatas and the organ works. You will not be disappointed if you choose this version, and the two are complementary in many ways, even if I slightly prefer Johnstone’s on the Treutmann organ, where the accompanying downloadable notes provide detailed registrations for every number.*

Many of the pieces on these two CDs are regularly ignored by players and recitalists. But this wonderful music represents Bach’s compositional maturity as he selected and edited a number of pieces to which he clearly wished to give a continuing life, rather as he did by parodying some favourite cantata numbers for the four ‘Lutheran Masses’. We ignore these preludes at our peril if we wish to understand the corpus of organ music as a key part of the whole project to furnish a ‘well-ordered church music’.

David Stancliffe

* Martin Gester kindly sent a link to the French section of his website where the registrations ARE listed. Please click HERE.

Categories
Recording

Telemann: Violin Concertos

CD cover Telemann Isabelle Faust akamus

Isabelle Faust violin, Akademie für alte Musik Berlin, Konzertmeister Bernhard Forck
79:35
harmonia mundi HMM 902756

With this latest release on harmonia mundi, Isabelle Faust and Akamus Berlin display a considerable synergetic assurance with technical agility whilst approaching these selected Telemann works. Mostly known pieces, with even the Suite having had several previous outings on disc, as with the “Gulliver-suite”; the “Frog” Concerto in A major was first heard in 1998 on Decca. It is slightly ironic that the lesser-knowns on the menu are a circular canon by J. J. Quantz (formerly listed in the Appendix of the TWV as Anh. 40: 103), and a Fantasia, not TWV 40: 22 but TWV 40: 4! Eschewing the works the composer wrote specifically for violin, this piece is lifted from the flute fantasias c.1731, and might have been dispensed with for TWV 51: a2, or the impressive quartet sonata, TWV 40: 200.

This said, the “Relinge” Pond frogs concerto and Gulliver-suite offer scope of expression, and delightful wittiness to sweep the mind away, but it is these two splendid book-ends in this collection that really dazzle, showcasing both composer and soloist’s ability for Italianate panache a la Vivaldi, although the Suite (TWV 55: h4) is a “Brassage” (mixed-brew) of French and Italian. Faust and Akamus capture and own these excellent pieces with some true “Bravoura” and daring “ Rodomontade” (two movements from TWV 55: h4). Her “sleeping beauty” Strad (1704) is fully awake! All the music is couched in a smooth, accomplished synergy, and the polished trumpet playing of Ute Hartwich is pitch perfect and never overstated, the fine interplay in TWV 53: D5 with Faust is really quite captivating, this piece almost certainly aimed at Pisendel, the composer’s friend and gifted virtuoso at Dresden.

Setting aside the minor aberrations of the Quantz and the fantasia, this is a recording of quality with a real dash of showmanship, and should catch the ears of any would-be doubters of Telemann’s powers to provide music of calibre, wit, and heartfelt, dynamic melodic lines. This recording will seek out a wider appreciation and acclaim: Beauty and “Bravoura” have been awoken!

David Bellinger

Categories
Recording

Haydn: String Quartets, op 33: 4–6

CD cover Haydn op 33 4-6 Chiaroscuro BIS

Chiaroscuro Quartet
57:22
BIS-2608

This release marks the completion of Haydn’s opus 33 set of six string quartets by the Chiaroscuro Quartet, the first disc having been reviewed on this site. The quartet of course takes its name from the Baroque painting device in which a brightly-lit subject is strongly contrasted with a dark background. There is little dark background – or indeed darkness of any kind – in these quartets, which, apart from marking Haydn’s arrival as the first great composer in the mediu,m are particularly notable for their joyous nature and displays of fun and good humour. It is no surprise to find five of the quartets carrying the rare (for this period) marking ‘scherzo’, rather than ‘minuet’, and more than one observer has suggested that Haydn must have been particularly happy during this period of his life (the early 1780s) to have written such engagingly light-hearted music. It was however Haydn’s greatest biographer H C Robbins Landon who pertinently reminded us that this was also the period when Haydn was in the first flush of his love affair with the singer Luigia Polzelli; it is certainly not fanciful to see in these spirited and joyous pieces the work of a man in love.

Of the final three quartets, it is No 5 in G that is the most ambitious and striking. It is believed to be the earliest of the group to have been composed, but its opening Vivace assai is marked by a confidence and dramatic drive that suggest something far more mature. Although the material, like so much of that in op 33, has folk-like connotations, the development in particular has an animated dramatic drive, while the end of the movement finds Haydn experimenting with a full-blooded texture of the kind we associate more with the Beethoven string quartets. The following Largo e cantabile movement is perfectly paced, showing both here and in the Largo third movement of the Quartet no 4 that the Chiaroscuros well understand the 18th-century meaning of “Largo”, quite different to the much slower tempo implied by later use of the word. Equally impressive here is the beautiful shaping of the melodic line by leader Alina Ibragimova, the movement essentially being an operatic aria in which the singer has been replaced by the first violin. The succeeding Scherzo Allegro introduces one of Haydn’s many moments of sheer fun, the joke being that the music constantly sounds as if it is going somewhere significant but never does, always just petering out just as it finally seems to have got going. It hardly needs saying that The Chiaroscuros need no encouragement to make the most of it. The Finale is a set of variations on an irresistible siciliano theme, the variants giving the opportunity for all the members of the quartet to show off their considerable talents.

I’ve concentrated on the G-major Quartet particularly, but of course its delights are replicated in the other two quartets to some degree or another. Perhaps mention can be made of the whirlwind finale of No 4 in B-flat, one movement where it might be possible to raise an eyebrow about the very fast tempo (it is marked Presto) but the Quartet bring it off with such winning élan and make so much of the jokey ending – silences and the introduction of pizzicato – that any impending criticism is rapidly silenced.

Throughout these two reviews, it has been my intention to convey the fact that these are very distinguished performances indeed. The Chiaroscuro Quartet have had a change of personnel since recording the first three quartets, Charlotte Saluste-Bridoux taking over as second violin from Pablo Hernán Benedi and thus making the quartet now an all-woman group. To their balance and superb technique the change has not made one iota of audible difference. That’s to say the Chiaroscuros remain one of the most technically accomplished period instrument ensembles playing today.

Brian Robins

Categories
Recording

Beethoven: Late String Quartets

CD cover Beethoven Late Quartets Narratio Quartet

Narratio Quartet
241:06 (4 CDs)
Challenge Classics CC72982

This completes the Narratio Quartet’s path-breaking and challenging set of the Beethoven string quartets. EMR reviews of the two earlier sets issued can be found here and here respectively. For the sake of clarity, it should be noted that the F-minor Quartet, op. 95 of 1810, usually tacked on to the middle period quartets, is included in the present set, chronologically if not entirely stylistically a little incongruously since it predates the genuine ‘late’ quartets by 15 years.

As noted in regard to the earlier sets, the Narratio’s period instrument performances are in some ways a reaction to the philosophy of the foundations of the 20th-century early music revival. That sought to be truthful (or authentic) in its treatment of the music of the past by means of the use of instruments of the period and faithful adherence to matters such as rhythm and tempo. Yet we know that such a ‘pure’ manner of interpretation was not the way music was played in the time of Mozart and Beethoven, that greater freedom was admitted to performance for the purposes of creating expressive gesture. That freedom included such features as rubato – rhythmic flexibility – vibrato employed for expressive purpose and portamento, the ‘slurring’ or sliding from one note to another. Needless to say, such means should be carefully thought through before use, and it is much to the credit of the Narratio’s that they have been thinking about and experimenting with the use of expressive devices in Beethoven’s quartets over a period of some 15 years. It is interesting to note too that this rethinking of what we call ‘period performing practice’ is increasingly extending to vocal music, where topics such as vibrato, rubato and portamento are also becoming questioned and debated. Finally, before brief observations on the individual quartets, it has been encouraging to note that throughout the Narratio’s set they have been happy to engage with Beethoven in one aspect of his music so frequently overlooked or forgotten – his wit and sense of humour. It stems, I think, from the 19th-century elevation of the composer to the status of a god, only to be the subject of awesome worship, not a great composer who laughs at us or invites us to laugh with him.

The String Quartet in F minor bids fair to be considered one of the knottiest of his works. Composed in 1810, a year that witnessed little productivity on Beethoven’s part, it was published five years later. Clues to the intensely personal nature of the work can be found in Beethoven’s designation of it as ‘quartetto serioso’ and his curious words to Sir George Smart when the composer sent a copy to London, ‘The Quartett (sic) is written for a small circle of connoisseurs and is never to be performed in public’. The Narratios attack the opening with uncompromising vigour, while the almost immediate lyrical response provides a fine example of their use of portamento and rubato. Lasting little more than five minutes, the movement here has a concise intensity that never lets up. This economy, the impression of saying nothing superfluous, characterises the quartet as a whole and is well caught by the Narratios who also make much of the lovely cantabile that forms the answering motive in the second movement.

It would be almost fifteen years before Beethoven returned to the medium. He then between 1824 and 1826 completed the five quartets now universally referred to as ‘the Late String Quartets’. These works, in particular the middle three (opp 130, 131 and 132), suggest a summation that not only expands the string quartet – structure, radical uses of tonality, texture, rhythm – to a degree that would inhibit the approach to the form by composers at least until the 20th century.

The Quartet in E-flat, op 127 occupied Beethoven between 1824 and 1825. Often considered the most ‘normal’ of the late quartets, it nevertheless stakes its claim to be unusual by including a slow movement that is virtually twice as long as any other of the three remaining movements. Marked ‘Adagio, ma non troppo e molto cantabile’, its nearly 15 minutes duration take us into a world of intense introversion that demands a concentration from both players and listener, here superbly achieved by the Narratios. The players also react well to the more animated central section, one of the many passages throughout these performances where the listener’s attention is drawn to the outstanding balance these players achieve. By contrast the Scherzo, with its constantly iterated perky theme reminding us how economical Beethoven could be with thematic material, shows us a more robustly committed side of the Narratios, the central folk-dance like Trio is celebrated with uninhibited pleasure and not a little of the good humour alluded to above.

If there is any doubt that Beethoven was entering new territory, it can be firmly dispelled in the face of the opening of the B-flat Quartet, op 130 of 1825. In every sense – sonority and expansive breadth – this is music that occupies a landscape greater than had previously been attempted. It’s a moment that the Narratio Quartet captures to near perfection, the massive sound picture enhanced by the satisfyingly bronzed sound of bow on gut strings. This sense of being at one with the music pervades the work, planned on a unique scale that includes six movements. The penultimate of these is the formidable Grande (or Grosse) Fugue, a movement found so difficult by the original performers and friends of the composer that the latter persuaded Beethoven to write a more concise, user-friendly alternative. Today it is that movement that is more frequently played. Overall, the performance is an impressive illustration of the manner in which the players invariably and instinctively seem to be at one with the music. In this context, it should be mentioned that tempi, which I’ve not mentioned until now, are never a cause for concern. The intelligence of the players can also be noted that although they play the famous Cavatina ‘molto espressivo’ as Beethoven asked, they keep such external signs of expression as portamento and rubato under strict control. Music of such sublime simplicity and introversion has no need of such tools.

The only other movement among this set that the composer marks ‘molto espressivo’ is the Adagio of op 131 in C-sharp minor (composed 1825-26) and here was one of the rare cases I disagreed with the use of portamento, in the first violin’s opening upward sweep from G# to C#, a gesture subsequently imitated by the other players. Like the Cavatina, it is fundamentally a simple, but profound almost hymn–like subject that needs no adornment. Although the quartet is in seven movements (two of which – the second and fifth – demand and here receive a virtuoso response from the performers) it is fundamentally structurally closer to the tradition four-movement quartet. The third movement, a brief accompanied recitative, is for example clearly linked to the monumental slow movement, a sublime aria of the utmost tenderness which although passing through a period of more animated disquiet ends with music and performers totally at peace and at one.

As with the C-sharp minor quartet, the Quartet in A minor, op 132 of 1825 has multiple-movements, here five dominated by the expansive opening and third movements. The latter is headed ‘Heiliger Dankgesang eines Genesenen’ (a holy hymn of thanks of a convalescent to a Deity), a reminder that Beethoven had been seriously ill during the preceding winter. If this movement can thus be seen as autobiographical, then the same surely applies to the opening Assai sostenuto, which appears to arise out of the memories of some unrelated nightmare. Both these passages are played with deeply introverted concentration by the Narratios, the sustained bass chords of both passages played with rasping intensity. But op 132 is by no means a tragic quartet; as so often with the mature quartets, it passes through many moods, the final Allegro appassionato embracing both affection in its lilting opening and deeply troubling thoughts in the animated central section.

Beethoven’s final string quartet, op 135 in F, on first appearances appears to mark something like a return to convention. It is cast in four movements and, unlike its immediate forbear,s plays no longer than a quartet by Haydn or Mozart. But such appearances are deceptive and not only ignore the sublime third movement, marked Assai lento, cantante e tranquillo, which enjoys a profoundly spiritual inner life of its own quite as intense as the Cavatina of op 130 or the Andante of op 131, but the autobiographical element of the final movement. This has occupied Beethoven scholars since the work’s composition, with its opening quotation of the three-note motif, ‘Es muss sein?’ (must it be?), later answered ‘ja, es muss sein’ (yes, it must be).

Once again, there is an autobiographical explanation for the origin, if not for Beethoven’s use of the motif here in the final quartet movement he would write. The more I hear these quartets, the more I feel there is possibly an even greater personal element to them than we realise. Such thoughts have certainly been enhanced by these Narratio Quartet performances, which demand to be heard even by those familiar with this music. It should be added that they are presented in superb sound that aids the multitude of sonorities admirably. There will be things here that surprise, things to relish and, perhaps, things to disturb or even infuriate. One thing I can promise: you will not be bored.

Brian Robins

Categories
Recording

A Tribute to Mikhail Vysotsky (1791-1837)

A Tribute to Mikhail Vysotsky (1791-1837)

John Schneidermann & Oleg Timofeyev (Seven-string guitars), 74:38
Prima Classic PRIMA075

Mikhail Vysotsky was a Russian guitarist who was born in 1791 in the village of Ochakovo. He moved to Moscow in 1813, where he performed as a virtuoso guitarist, and was in demand as a guitar teacher. In his liner notes, Oleg Timofeyev describes Vysotsky as “Disorganized and impractical in daily life. Vysotsky drank himself to death by 1837.” Vysotsky wrote music for the Russian seven-string guitar, which had become extremely popular by the beginning of the 19th century. Timofeyev notes that there are about a hundred of Vysotsky’s compositions which were published: preludes, fantasias, dances, transcriptions of piano music and opera arias. There are a few pieces which survive in manuscript. The twelve tracks on the present CD are variations on popular Russian songs. The first eight tracks are performed by John Schneidermann, and the last four by Oleg Timofeyev.

The first track, “Along the street”, is Vysotsky’s take on a well-known Russian song. It is a jolly piece, with variations involving continuous quavers, with slurred notes and harmonics thrown in here and there for variety. There are little touches of chromaticism which brighten what is straightforward conventional diatonic harmony. Vysotsky is in good company: the Spanish composer Fernando Sor, wrote variations for two guitars on the same song in his “Souvenir de Russie”.

“Show yourself the clear moon” is in a similar vein. There are grace notes and similar decorative effects, and attractive scalic passages running up and down the neck of the guitar, but harmony is limited to the folk singer’s three-chord trick of tonic, dominant and subdominant. One variation switches to triplets, followed by another which consists of dotted rhythms.

A more sombre mood pervades “Mother I have a headache”. It is in a minor key, and a feeling of unease is created by occasional diminished sevenths. Schneidermann plays expressively with a delicacy of touch, so it is unfortunate that there are occasional obtrusive noises from the strings as he slides his finger along them. Perhaps this can’t be helped, but it does stand out at 3.07. In contrast, portamento slides are used to good effect in “Variations on a Tyrolean Theme.” Vysotsky’s music is designed for easy listening, and Schneidermann’s nimble fingers create a charming performance.

Oleg Timofeyev is responsible for the last four tracks. I like his interpretation of “I used to know no worries”, which is a delightful piece full of contrasts. The very high notes towards the end are particularly satisfying. The music for track 11, “My strip of land”, is available online at IMSLP, where it has the title “Is it not the Field, my little Field”. I wonder if Timofeyev used a different source for the recording, because there are so many places where what he plays does not match the IMSLP score. Variation 6 begins with a passage of 20 single notes. Timofeyev plays them as harmonics, apart from c# which is not available as a harmonic. The result is unsatisfactory, since the c#s obtrusively sound an octave lower than the other notes. It is clear from the IMSLP score, that the first 13 notes should be played normally at the written pitch, and only the last seven notes should be played as harmonics.

One welcome feature of the CD is Oleg Timofeyev’s commentary in the liner notes: He provides information about the songs and their text, about Vysotsky’s life, and the musical context in Russia. “Russia of that time was a place of constant singing everywhere. Coachmen in carriages, rowers in boats, women washing the laundry – everybody was singing in villages, towns and cities.”

Stewart McCoy

Categories
Recording

Clérambault: Te Deum, Histoire de la femme adultère

CD cover Clérambault Te Deum Histoire de la femme adultère Van Mechelen

Choeur de Chambre de Namur, A nocte temporis, directed by Reinoud Van Mechelen
58:36
Versailles Spectacles CVS163

Member of a family with a long musical association with the French court, Nicolas Clérambault (1676-1749) is today remembered principally as arguably the finest composer of the French secular cantata. However, he was also a distinguished organist who held the post of organist of Saint-Sulpice in Paris from 1715. Commenced in the mid-17th century, the building of the church of Saint-Sulpice (a replacement for a much smaller original church) was not completed until a century later. It is likely that Clérambault’s Te Deum was one of a number of his works given at the lavish opening celebrations in July 1745. Although designated ‘à grand choeur’ and according to reports originally performed by 100 musicians, it is overall less ostentatiously spectacular than familiar examples of the hymn by Lully and Charpentier. While the scoring includes the expected trumpets and drums, they are used sparingly, while in keeping with the custom for French settings the work is colourfully multi-sectional, contrasting solo passages with full choral passages. The composer makes the hub of the work the verse ‘Tibi Cherubim et Seraphim’ (To thee Cherubim and Seraphim), at once the most extended and elaborate passage in the work. Opening with the ethereal high voices of the angels’ praise of God, the section segues into dramatic contrast with the outburst of trumpets and drums at ‘Pleni sunt caeli’ (Heaven and earth are full). Other notable moments include the exceptionally lovely choral devotional passage at ‘Te ergo’ (We therefore pray).

While not aspiring to the use of 100 performers – the forces are fewer than half that number – the intimacy of so much of the writing makes for a highly satisfying reading of the work. The many solos and duets, often involving quite florid melisma, are well taken by a fine team, with haute-contre Reinoud Van Mechelen, tenor Guy Cutting and bass Lisandro Abadie particularly distinguishing themselves. The choral singing and orchestral playing are equally satisfying.

If the Te Deum is something of a discovery, I’m tempted to say that here it must give way to an even more exceptional work. As French Baroque music expert Catherine Cessac notes in her customarily valuable notes, L’Histoire de la femme adultère is something of an anomaly, an oratorio after the style of those of Charpentier, composed well after such works had passed into history. Like those of Charpentier (and his model Carissimi), it employs a narrator to tell a biblical story, in this case one of the most touching of those involving Christ’s ministry on earth. The story of the adulterous woman comes from the Gospel of St John, and tells of Christ’s forgiveness of a woman accused of adultery, a crime for which she would of course have been put to death. The story revolves around the famous words by which He puts her accusers to shame – ‘He that is without sin among you, let him cast the first stone’. Unsurprisingly, Clérambault’s setting puts these words at the heart of the oratorio, with a sublime passage of wonderment for the Narrator and chorus. But the work’s remarkable quality is apparent from the outset, a darkly sombre ‘simphonie’. In addition to the Narrator (Abadie) there are roles for Jesus (Van Mechelen), the Adulterous Woman, beautifully sung with sensitive insight by Gwendoline Blondeel, and two Jewish accusers.

Anyone yet to discover Clérambault is urged to hear this exceptional recording. Then go on to explore some of the composer’s secular cantatas, starting with Orphée.

Brian Robins