Music by Hume, Marais, Bach, Dollé, Purcell, Couperin
Kaori Uemura gamba, Ricardo Rodríguez Miranda gamba, Aline Zylberajch harpsichord
63:06
Ramée RAM2204
The Japanese viol player Kaori Uemura has chosen the yamato or old Japanese word “kagami” for a mirror as the title of her CD to acknowledge the fact that musicians of the 17th and 18th centuries viewed music as a reflection of the divine. Of the composers represented, Charles Dollé is perhaps the only unfamiliar one. He was active as a gambist in and around Paris in the first half of the 18th century and was much in demand as a teacher and performer. He left a large body of published music for gamba of which Uemura gives us the attractive Premiere Suite from Pieces de Viole avec Basse Continue (1737). In this and the other more familiar music, Uemura’s rich tone, declamatory style and technical dexterity combine with the musicality of the whole ensemble to give us a very enjoyable account of his chosen repertoire. A couple of pieces are arrangements, of which that for solo viol of Dido’s Lament by Purcell is particularly effective and affecting. Although with its visionary title and its prologue, three acts and epilogue this recording seems unnecessarily to aspire to be more than the sum of its parts, what it is is a thoroughly effective programme of familiar and unfamiliar music compellingly played and a joy to listen to.
D. James Ross