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| Sketch: Miri Shamir |
Not quite the lavish palace of
Versailles, the elegant conference hall of the Jerusalem International YMCA
was, however, a splendid venue for “In King Louis’ Chambers” performed by
soloists of the Jerusalem Baroque Orchestra on June 16th, 2021. JBO first violinist
Noam Schuss introduced the works.
Danish organist
Dietrich Buxtehude is known mostly for his organ music, his cantatas and for
the long journey the young Johann Sebastian Bach undertook to meet him. Sadly, Buxtehude’s
chamber works count among the least known of his compositions. Numbering
twenty-two in all, they are influenced by Italian models, especially by the
instrumental sonatas of the Venetian Giovanni Legrenzi circulating widely in
Northern Europe, but they are also oriented to the German tradition of violin
writing. All are of the ensemble sonata genre, then still in its infancy.
Schuss remarked that Buxtehude’s Sonata in g minor for violin, viola da gamba
and continuo was the only work on the program not relevant to the entertainment
style of the court of Louis XIV, but that the connection was the viol, an
instrument common in French consort music. Performing the sonata at the
Jerusalem concert were Noam Schuss-violin, Tal Arbel-viola da gamba, Ophira
Zakai-theorbo and Aviad Stier-harpsichord. The artists gave lively utterance to
the improvisational, imaginative, expressive and colourful mannerisms of
Buxtehude, his style referred to by Johann Mattheson in 1739 as “stylus
fantasticus”. Led securely by Schuss, they presented the work’s remarkable contrasts,
its hectic rhythms, its virtuosic writing, the frequent dialogues between
violin and viola da gamba, its rhetorical devices and dancelike sections.
Exciting music indeed and a delectable concert item!
And to music of the
French court of Versailles. François Couperin, employed at the fashionable
capital of 18th century artistic style, was known as a trendsetter – the author
of a stylish and refined style, in which virtuosity and good taste met at eye
level. Although better known today as a composer of harpsichord music, he
wrote chamber music throughout his career. In “Les Nations”, published in 1726,
each of the four “ordres” celebrates a Catholic power of Europe - France,
Spain, the Holy Roman Empire and the Savoy dynasty of Piedmont. The Baroque period
was fascinated by such confrontations between nations via the medium of music.
Representative of François Couperin’s preoccupation with “les goûts réunis” (the
combination of French and Italian styles), each “ordre” is a combination
of an Italianate trio sonata with its free-form virtuosity and a large-scale
and elaborate French dance suite. Violinist Dafna Ravid joined the players
for a performance of “La Françoise”. The JBO soloists presented the many
aspects of the work - its fast flow of mood changes, plangent melodies, courtly
dance sections, the unmannered statement of some semplice melodies, solid
orchestral-type textures and poignant moving moments (the Sarabande’s
role), all played articulately and with flair, with suave shaping, elegant
ornamentation and stylistic touches. Fine court entertainment, the players
combined informed historical perspective with their lively artistic
spirit.
Louis-Nicolas
Clérambault was from a well-connected family, his family known for its musical
service to French royalty. He himself served both at Versailles and at royal
churches during the reigns of Louis XIV and Louis XV. He was particularly known
for his cantatas, these incorporating Italian techniques into a thoroughly
French genre and mostly dealing quite dramatically with subjects taken from classical
mythology and legend. The JBO program concluded with one of Clérambault’s small
soprano operas “Léandre et Héro” (1713), sung by Daniela Skorka. Cantatas of
this kind and setting were written for performance by small ensembles in
the salons of the upper echelons of society. “Léandre et Héro” is based on
the tragic story of two lovers. Hero lives on the Grecian side of the
Hellespont Strait, Leander on the Asian side. To reach his lover, Leander swims
the Hellespont at night. However, as fate would have it, the jealous god of the
north wind elicits a storm in which Leander drowns. Hero, grief-stricken,
throws herself into the waves. Neptune, however, brings the lovers into the realm
of immortals, where they are united forever. Contending well with the French
text and its word painting and communicating with the audience, Skorka sang
with clarity and beautiful control. She gave convincing
expression to Clérambault’s range of emotions - of eager love, heroic resolve;
of terror and inconsolable grief - capturing the wistful atmosphere as well
as the intense dramatic moments making up such "mini-operas". From
the first elegant sounds of the opening trio-sonata-like prelude, the players, in
tutti and in different small combinations, made the listener aware of the
composer’s brilliant, illustrative instrumental writing - adding intimacy to
Hero’s thoughts, evoking the zephyrs to accompany melismatic vocal
passages to some of the movements, creating the ferocity of the storm with its
fast passagework for the instruments (including the viola da gamba), then
taking one’s breath away with the sudden, hushed finality as the “darkness,
intensifying, extinguishes the torch of the night.” However, moving into the
world of immortals is guaranteed to send the audience home in good spirits, as
the piece concluded with a graceful Air, the text to its jaunty, buoyant
rhythms delivering a reproach to Love – “always on the most tender of
lovers fall the cruelest sufferings”.
Without the Versailles
Palace’s crystal chandeliers glittering with reflected light from mirrors
and its paintings framed by ornate, gold-leafed plaster moldings, the YMCA
conference hall is nevertheless an attractive room with fine acoustics, well
suited to Baroque chamber music, giving the stage to the artists' scrupulous balance of sound and the subtlety of this repertoire. An evening of festive, high-quality
performance by JBO soloists.
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