Jordi Savall is in town, appearing in not only the Cal Performances Music Before 1850 series but also with the Philharmonia Baroque Orchestra, an organization with which he has a long-standing relationship. A celebrated soloist and the director of his three renowned ensembles—Hespèrion XXI, La Capella Reial de Catalunya, and Le Concert des Nations—Savall is widely admired not only for his virtuosic playing but as a researcher of early music who has brought many forgotten works to music audiences around the world.
In this past week’s performance, titled The French Suite in Europe, Savall conducted the Philharmonia Baroque in a scholarly and beguiling look at French Baroque music, opening with the Suite du Ballet de Stockholm, attributed to Guillaume Dumanoir.
Dumanoir was a composer and member of the king’s orchestra, the Vingt-quatre Violins du Roy. In 1658, Louis XIV named him Roi des violons, maitres a danser, et joueurs d’instruments tant haut que bas, a rather exalted title for what appears to be a union musician’s job, albeit a royal one. That he was a dance master is blazingly apparent in this suite. The music is all insistently rhythmic, mercurial yet consistent. Beginning with a glorious “Intrada” of drum and trumpet, the piece moves swiftly through all the decorous delicacy and stately lyricism so characteristic of early music. A number of dances follow with piquant groupings of instruments: violin with theorbo, cello, bass and continuo; flute with theorbo and percussion; violin and guitar. Theorbo player David Tayler got emphatic applause for his lyrical and light touch across the strings, which he deserved. As did concertmaster Katherine Kyme. But it’s unfair to pinpoint just a few musicians: all the musicians were excellent.
Most striking among the short movements of Suite from Alceste, extracted from Jean-Baptiste Lully’s gorgeous 1674 opera, was “Echoes,” in which a trumpet, oboe and cello provide the offstage echoes of their onstage companions in a beautifully timed and dynamically evocative call-and-response. The Alceste Suite, which breathes a touch of royal pomp and grandeur on the listener, is full of expressiveness.
Savall treated everyone to a virtuosic display on the viola de gamba in Telemann’s Ouverture in D Major for Viola da gamba, strings and continuo. Unlike the other suites, which kept shifting continuously between groups of instruments, the Ouverture has long passages for the viola da gamba, with support from a smaller ensemble—four violins, one viola, two cellos, one bass, theorbo and continuo—throughout in rhythmically frisky melodies and fugal repetitions.
Unlike members of the violin family, the viola da gamba is usually tuned in fourths, similar to that of the modern six-string guitar. The bow is held palm up, fascinating in itself, which allows the instrumentalist to exert more pressure on the strings through manipulating the bow. The instrument has a gentle tone, even throughout the music’s quicker lines.
This engaging concert finished with two suites from Handels’ Water Music.
Even on the most basic level—the instruments as objects—the Philharmonia Baroque is fascinating, with its theorbo, or long-necked lute; wooden flutes, recorders, oboe and bassoon, the Baroque long trumpets, and for Handel’s Water Music, a pair of amazing horns, with their lack of valves, narrow bells, and wild loops of metal tubes.
—Jaime Robles
The Philharmonia Baroque continues its performances with Jordi Savall on Friday, March 12 in Palo Alto and Saturday, March 13, in Lafayette. For information and tickets, call 415-252-1288 or visit www.philharmonia.org.