Le Concert Spirituel / Hervé Niquet LULLY Armide

ARMIDE

Alice Foccroulle, Reinoud Van Mechelen, InAlto, Lambert Colson TEATRO SPIRITUALE (ROME, C. 1610)

This recording transports us to Rome’s Chiesa Nuova, the Oratory Church where in 1600 the premiere took place of the first spiritual opera, La Rappresentatione di Anima e di Corpo by Cavalieri. That pioneering spirit has inspired this programme devised by InAlto. Among the manuscripts in the church’s library is an anonymous source, probably dating from the very beginning of the 17th century, containing a complete cycle of settings of those seven psalms that ever since the time of Saint Augustine have been called the ‘Penitenial Psalms’. This Roman score is absolutely unique of its kind, being monodic, and composed in the early operatic melodic narrative style of recitar cantando. InAlto presents here a completely original approach, one that puts this early 17th-century repertoire in its context by recreating, in the tradition of the Oratorian spiritual exercises, an imaginary ritual that might unfold in the days preceding Holy Week, one in which each of the penitential psalms takes on its full meaning; while the extraordinary musical dissonances encoded in this manuscript are guaranteed to shock the listener...

Les Pages et Les Chantres du Centre de Musique Baroque de Versailles / Collegium Marianum / Olivier Schneebeli MICHEL-RICHARD DE LALANDE Grands Motets

One of the great composing figures from the French Baroque, Michel-Richard de Lalande is starting to receive his just dues through modern recordings, and Glossa is happy to unveil a new release featuring Olivier Schneebeli directing Les Pages et Les Chantres du Centre de Musique Baroque de Versailles in three of Lalande’s sumptuous grands motets. Very much a favoured composer during the reign of Louis XIV, Lalande progressively assumed – from the 1680s onwards – more and more of the principal court offices, and was called upon to provide sacred music for the Chapelle Royale within the Château de Versailles. Although the new (and ‘definitive’) chapel was not consecrated until 1710, the trio of grands motets (extended multi-movement choral and solo settings, typically of Psalms, with instrumental accompaniment) recorded here will have been conceived of according to the chapel’s architectural and acoustical characteristics. Thomas Leconte, from the CMBV, provides an illuminating historical backdrop in his booklet essay.

Much detailed performing information from Lalande’s time is known today – including number of instrumental forces used and about the composer’s later revisions of his scores – and Venite, exultemus Domino, De profundis and Dominus regnavit all receive expressive and meticulously-prepared performances within the Chapelle Royale itself. To the quality of preparation of the CMBV maîtrise can be added the presence of a quartet of vocal soloists deeply experienced in the style of music from this time: Chantal Santon-Jeffery, Reinoud Van Mechelen, François Joron and Lisandro Abadie. Likewise, the contribution of Jana Semerádová’s Collegium Marianum provides exemplary instrumental support to Schneebeli’s direction in this new CMBV production.

Le Banquet Céleste / Damien Guillon CALDARA Maddalena ai piedi di Christo

Baroque is capricious and dramatic; it grabs you by the throat. But a work in which music and theatre fit together as grippingly as in Caldara's Maddalena ai piedi di Cristo is rare. In this iconic oratorio, Celestial and Earthly Love battle for the soul of sinner Mary Magdalene, who has her sister Martha and Christ himself as allies. With this magnificent work, with an exquisite cast of singers, Damien Guillon and his Banquet Céleste take the company into a new chapter.

Born in Venice around 1670, Caldara gave Barcelona the first opera ever heard in Catalonia, Il più bel nome (1708), commissioned by his patron, the future Emperor Charles VI, before eventually settling in Vienna in the latter’s service in 1716. A prolific composer with three thousand works to his credit, Caldara died in the Austrian capital in 1736 – in the Kärtnerstrasse, like Vivaldi five years later . . . and in a similar state of destitution. [...] The genre, born in the wake of the Counter-Reformation and illustrated notably by the Roman composers Carissimi and Landi, was initially sung in Latin and performed in pious confraternities. But La Maddalena is an oratorio volgare, that is, sung in Italian. [...] The protagonists of La Maddalena, six in number, are split between Earth and Heaven. They are Martha, Mary Magdalene and a Pharisee on the one hand; Jesus, Earthly Love and Divine Love on the other. They divide among them thirty-three arias and ensembles, in a sequence alternating recitative and aria. (Vincent Borel)

A Nocte Temporis / Reinoud Van Mechelen CLÉRAMBAULT Cantates Françaises

“A nocte temporis”: Latin translation of the French expression “depuis la nuit des temps”, which means “from time immemorial”. A nod towards the past, towards what is changing, and especially also towards what remains unchanged.

After several years of activity as a soloist with conductors such as William Christie, Philippe Herreweghe, Hervé Niquet, Christophe Rousset, and many others, Reinoud Van Mechelen founds his own ensemble in 2016. His goal is to present historically informed music as well as to emotionally touch an as large audience as possible. For this purpose he surrounds himself with musicians who share this passion with him and who are ready to take up this challenge.

Reinoud Van Mechelen / A Nocte Temporis BACH Erbarme Dich

Since he completed his master studies in 2012 at the Conservatoire Royal in Brussels (class of Dina Grossberger), Reinoud Van Mechelen has established himself on the international stage. 

In 2007 he caught attention at the Académie Baroque Européenne in Ambronay under the baton of Hervé Niquet. In 2011 he was a member of the "Jardin des Voix" of William Christie and Paul Agnew and became soon a regular soloist of Les Arts florissants. With Les Arts florissants he has performed at the Festival d'Aix-en-Provence, the Edinburgh Festival, the Château de Versailles, the Bolchoï Theatre in Moscow, the Royal Albert Hall and the Barbican Centre in London, the Palais des Beaux-Arts in Brussels, the Philharmonie in Paris, the Opéra Comique and the Brooklyn Academy of Music in New York. 

At the same time he is a guest with international ensembles such as Collegium Vocale, Le Concert Spirituel, La Petite Bande, Les Talens Lyriques, Pygmalion, Le Poème Harmonique, Il Gardellino, Insula Orchestra, L’Arpeggiata, Ludus Modalis, B’Rock, Ricercar Consort, Capriccio Stravagante, Scherzi Musicali, European Union Baroque Orchestra. 

 In 2014 Reinoud Van Mechelen performed his first Evangelist in J.S. Bach's Johannes passion with the Royal Liverpool Philharmonic. The season after he made his debut in a title role in an opera by Rameau, Dardanus, at the Opéra national de Bordeaux. 

In 2016/17 he will be debuting at the Zürich Opera in Charpentier's Médée(Jason) under the baton of William Christie. He will go a significant way ahead in extending his repertoire performing in concert Belmonte (Die Entführung aus dem Serail) with the Orchestre de Chambre de Paris and Gérald (Lakmé) with the Orchestra of the Bavarian Radio.