Alla Francesca / Brigitte Lesne / Gérard Lesne D'AMOURS LOIAL SERVANT

This recital continues a series begun by Alla Francesca on Opus 111, of which it is the third instalment (and the group's first recording for this label). I had preferred the first, 'Beaulte parfaite' (7/98), to the sequel, 'Armes, amours' (A/98). Here again is a rather mixed bag, ranging from Machaut to Ciconia and Cordier. The ensemble's three musicians are joined by the countertenor Gerard Lesne, who appears in much earlier repertory than we are used to hearing him in. His presence allows the group to explore music with two upper parts of similar range, a shared characteristic of many of the pieces sung here. Yet despite some fine singing, the vocal interventions seem strangely restrained, which is all the odder given that these are French musicians, from whom one might expect a more characterful approach to text (in this regard I would except Brigitte Lesne, whose ability to put the words across effectively is admirable).
The ensemble's three instrumentalists show remarkable versatility (not to mention virtuosity) in deploying all manner of instruments: winds, bowed and plucked strings, percussion. The results are mixed (I must admit that the bagpipe solo had me reaching for the volume control), but can hardly be accused of lacking definition. As a whole, however, the recital seems a shade unfocused, partly (again) because the individual performances are so variable; set against the urgent delivery of Amour m'a le cuer, for instance, is the disappointment of Senleches's La harpe de melodie for which Alla Francesca has used the deficient reading of the Codex Chantilly (which the Ferrara Ensemble also used in their otherwise admirable 'En doulz castel de Pavie', Harmonia Mundi, 8/98). It is a great pity that the only satisfactory recording of this wonderful piece (on the Medieval Ensemble of London's 'Ce diabolic chant' on Decca) remains unavailable. On a more positive note, one must applaud Alla Francesca's determination to assemble a sizeable corpus of late-medieval song. This is a repertoire where the discography lags far behind both scholarly endeavour and concert performance. (Fabrice Fitch / Gramophone)

Il Seminario Musicale / Gérard Lesne CHARPENTIER Trois histoires sacrées

Marc-Antoine Charpentier composed about 35 histoires sacrées, essentially the same genre as the oratorio that had been developed by Giacomo Carissimi in Rome in the mid-seventeenth century. The texts were most frequently taken from the Hebrew Bible (although one of the works here has as its subject the Nativity), and most are relatively brief; the three included here last from about 12 to 37 minutes. The histoires sacrées primarily consist of solos and dialogues in the style of recitatives, in which singers take the roles of the characters in the drama, with a chorus acting as narrator. Only occasionally do soloists have what is conventionally understood as an aria, and when they do, the arias are not an excuse for showy vocalism, but have the purpose of advancing the drama, albeit with heightened melodic lyricism. For the listener who can put aside the expectations of the late Baroque oratorios of Handel or J.S. Bach, these intimate and deeply expressive works are immensely rewarding. Charpentier had a real gift for creating and managing dramatic tension through music, and these little gems have the character of brief operas. The longest of the three, Mors Saülis et Jonathae, has developed characters with musical individuality and a poignant story with an elegant dramatic arc. The ensemble Il Seminario Musicale, founded and conducted by French countertenor Gérard Lesne, performs these works with consummate musicality and sensitive attention to the subtleties of the texts. The soloists, including Lesne himself, sing with clear understanding of middle Baroque French performance practice and with robust, clean tone, and persuasively convey the emotion and theatricality of the stories. Naïve's sound is intimate, but with a nice sense of spaciousness. (Stephen Eddins)