- Juliette Guignard
Madly
Works by John Cage, Monsieur de Sainte-Colombe, William Young, François Rossé, Jean Lacquemant, Lionel Ginoux, Jean-Sébastien Bach, Karl Friedrich Abel, le sieur Demachy by Juliette Guignard (viola da gamba).
Co-founder of the ensemble Les Surprises, known for its performance of 17th century music.my and XVIIImy centuries from an original angle, Juliette Guignard here adopts a similar approach to the benefit of the viola da gamba. The title, Madlyof this first solo album seems more than justified at the end of a journey where passion expresses itself in audacity. As proof, these transcriptions of pieces for “prepared piano” by John Cage that Juliette Guignard could legitimately claim as her own compositions. The use of tweezers to modify the timbre of the apparent strings makes it an instrument closer to the winds, of the Hindu type, than the Balinese percussion “imitated” by Cage, but choreographic trance and primitive enchantment dominate the interpretation, consistent with the ideal of the American iconoclast. Meticulously designed according to the principle of the “dance ensemble” Popular in the Baroque era, the programme compares rather dull recent works (except those by Cage) and extravagant older pieces (Sainte-Colombe, Young, Abel). However, it remains a transcription that best attests to Juliette Guignard’s own exaltation, with the immersion of Bach’s violin in the turbulent waters of the viola. Pierre Gervasoni
Distribution Son ar Mein/UVM.
- Jean-Philippe Rameau
The Borders
With Gwendoline Blondeel, Tassis Christoyannis, Sabine Devieilhe, Thomas Dolié, Benedikt Kristjansson, Philippe Estèphe, Reinoud Van Mechelen, Orfeo Orchestra, György Vashegyi (conductor).
Rameau’s last opera, The Borders (1763) – neither performed nor published during the composer’s lifetime – waited until 1982 and the Aix-en-Provence Festival to see its first complete theatrical performance, conducted by John Eliot Gardiner, which gave rise to a first phonographic recording. The version recorded by William Christie followed in 2003. The 260th anniversary of the composer’s death brings with it the release of a new recording, which benefits from the latest advances in musicological research (instrumentarium, voice types), led by Sylvie Bouissou (Rameau, Opera omnia). At the head of a first-class cast is Sabine Devieilhe, whose musicality enchants as much as her superlative vocal qualities. At her side is the Belgian soprano Gwendoline Blondeel, a magnificent technician, whose timbre is a perfect match for that of the French coloratura. Men are not left out: from the moving Reinoud Van Mechelen to the extravagant Benedikt Kristjansson (Icelandic tenor), not forgetting the dynamic Tassis Christoyannis, the commitment of Thomas Dolié, the mastery of Philippe Estèphe. Under the direction of György Vashegyi, the Hungarian phalanx Orfeo Orchestra is ideal for its dramatic clarity and sensuality, while the Purcell Choir stands out for its homogeneity and prosodic perfection in French. Marie-Aude Roux
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