Beyer, Gli Incogniti - Couperin: Apotheoses (2014) [Official Digital Download - 24bit/88.2kHz]

×

Beyer, Gli Incogniti - Couperin: Apotheoses (2014) [Official Digital Download - 24bit/88.2kHz]

Close

When he published his two Apothéoses in memory of two great masters of music in 1724-25, François Couperin was asserting his desire to promote a meeting of the French and Italian styles – from a very Gallic point of view, naturally. The idea was to convince the French Muses that henceforth one could say sonade and cantade in their language – a strategy already pursued in the much earlier La Sultane and La Superbe. But, far from blindly imitating his idols, Couperin takes inspiration from their styles and adapts them to his own brio. The result is a delight for all to share with the musicians of Gli Incogniti and Amandine Beyer, whose first harmonia mundi recording this is.

En publiant dans les années 1724-25 ses deux “Apothéoses” à la mémoire de deux grands messieurs de la musique, François Couperin affirme la volonté de promouvoir la rencontre des styles français et italiens… d’un point de vue très français, bien sûr. On fera croire aux muses françaises que l’on dira désormais sonade et cantade dans leur langue – en témoignent La Sultane et La Superbe, largement antérieures. Loin d’imiter aveuglément ses idoles, Couperin s’inspire de leurs styles, il les adapte à sa propre verve : un plaisir à partager sans modération avec Gli Incogniti dont cet enregistrement marque la première collaboration d’Amandine Beyer avec harmonia mundi.

Als François Couperin 1724/25 seine zwei Apothéoses in Erinnerung an zwei große Herren der Musik veröffentlichte, bekräftigte er damit seinen Wunsch, den französischen und italienischen Stil einander anzunähern … freilich aus einer sehr französischen Sicht der Dinge. Er wollte den französischen Musen weismachen, dass man künftig in ihrer Sprache von sonade und cantade sprechen werde – wovon La Sultane und La Superbe schon viel früher zeugen. Doch weit davon entfernt, seine Idole blind zu imitieren, ließ sich Couperin von deren jeweiligem Stil inspirieren und passte ihn seinem eigenen Temperament an. Es ist ein Vergnügen, diese Erfahrung mit Gli Incogniti und Amandine Beyer zu teilen, die hier ihre erste Aufnahme für harmonia mundi vorlegen.

Composer: François Couperin
Performer: Amandine Beyer
Conductor: Amandine Beyer
Orchestra/Ensemble: Gli Incogniti

Reviews: The ensemble Gli incogniti, led by Amandine Beyer, makes their harmonia mundi début with this album of chamber music by François Couperin. When he published his two Apothéoses in memory of two great masters of music in 1724-25, François Couperin was asserting his desire to promote a meeting of the French and Italian styles – from a very Gallic point of view, naturally.

The idea was to convince the French Muses that henceforth one could say sonade and cantade in their language – a strategy already pursued in the much earlier La Sultane and La Superbe. But, far from blindly imitating his idols, Couperin takes inspiration from their styles and adapts them to his own brio.

The result is a delight for all to share with the musicians of Gli Incogniti and Amandine Beyer, whose first harmonia mundi recording this is.

Review by: David Vernier "ClassicsToday"
Sometime in the 1980s an ensemble called Fretwork released a recording that captured the sound and style of viol consort music as had never been done with such technical brilliance and affecting musicality. And the recorded sound was extraordinarily rich and warmly resonant, the melodies ingratiating, the harmonies soul-satisfying–you could just play the disc over and over and always get the same feeling of congenial calm. This is not a program of viol music, but it has the same spirit as that earlier Fretwork disc–and virtually the same effect (and affect).
Forget trying to understand the music on hand by reading the disc’s liner notes, which have less to do with the music and more to indulge regarding rhetoric and mythology. I have to admit that my intellectual resources are stretched when I read such passages as: “…it is precisely this tension, this confrontation of disparate elements, this delicate rhetorical and political balance, that makes the music of the French composers of the time so fascinating a world: it goes through two mediators, it sets up two triangles, often interpreted as antagonistic–Grace and Passion. It is worth noting here the Rumeur souterraine of the Apothéose de Lully, an avowed paraphrase of the concerti grossi of Corelli, associated with ardent sentiment: this intrudes between a divine Descente, noble and march-like, and a Plainte, an expression of intimate feeling, the instruments instructed to play very gently, in loure time. Each identity possesses its rhetorical weight and thus erects a theatrical framework.” Thankfully, we can just listen to the music and escape any confrontations with mediators and triangles.
And the music is wonderful. Couperin’s tributes to Corelli and Lully, laden with personalized stylistic and classical mythological references–Parnassus, Apollo, Muses, Hippocrene–smooth across the ear like the proverbial butter on warm pancakes. The combination of violins, keyboard, theorbo, and gamba easily give the impression that no more ideal group of instruments ever could have been conceived, this is such luxurious yet so intimate and so amazingly easy to listen to. And there are at least a few surprises, including the occasional, wonderful violin duets, and the gorgeous, mystifyingly beautiful first movement of La Sultane, which sounds like it comes from another time and place, a yet-unexplored world far removed from the conventional musical terroir of late-17th-century France.
Violinist Amandine Beyer & Co. are superb musicians whose first-rate performances and dedication to this project give us cause to take both a newly respectful look at these works and to cast a freshly interested eye on this composer’s non-keyboard, chamber compositions. My only complaint is that the subtitles, movement titles, and descriptions thereof are given only in French. Why? Yes, I can decipher them, armed with several years of French language study and my trusty French dictionary–but this shouldn’t be necessary in today’s world. What’s the problem with just giving us the translations? Anyway, don’t let this stop you from an ethereal listening experience. Highly recommended.