A landmark recording does full justice to Ockeghem's famed Mass

"This," says Fabrice Fitch in his review, "is a recording that was waiting to happen." Ensemble Musica Nova presents various complete versions of the Ockeghem Mass alongside each other. So if you can’t get enough of this Mass, here is your ideal answer. As variations on a theme, as it were, it’s a fascinating and rewarding exercise. The performances are excellent; one for the collection.

-- Gramophone [2/2008]

MOZART String Quartet No. 18. String Quintet in D, K 593 1 • Brentano Str Qrt; Hsin-Yun Huang (va) 1 • AEON 747 (62:25)


Chamber music enthusiasts not yet familiar with the Brentano String Quartet have a rare treat in store. Soon after joining forces in 1992, the quartet won the Cleveland Quartet and Naumburg prizes. Today they continue a rigorous schedule of international tours. As with all the finest quartets, Brentano’s members—violinists Mark Steinberg and Serena Canin, violist Misha Amory, and cellist Nina Maria Lee—are individually gifted players of the first rank. Their latest release is an unusual pairing of one of Mozart’s quartets dedicated to Haydn with the D-Major viola Quintet.


From the initial statement of the primary thematic material in the A-Major Quartet, the Brentano is at pains to give each line its individual expressive shape and proportion. Every gesture is imbued with meaning; every harmonic progression has a sense of inevitable forward momentum. The variations of the extended slow movement unfold as a series of vividly individual characters. The rich polyphonic textures of the Allegro non troppo finale, reflecting Mozart’s involvement with Bach’s music at the time, emerge in luminous colors and with breathtaking clarity.


Since one rarely encounters a string quartet followed by a quintet in either performances or recordings, hearing K 593 on the heels of the A-Major Quartet is astonishing: what an amplification of texture Mozart creates with the addition of another mezzo voice. The slow introduction to the opening Allegro is touching in its tenderness and uncertainty. In the Adagio, the dead-center intonation makes the chains of suspensions almost heart-rending. The Minuet, one of Mozart’s finest, is filled with contrast: savor, for instance, the delicacy of the pizzicatos in the Ländler-like trio. The joyous finale fairly bursts with ebullient vitality.


Technical values of the sound engineering, made at the Academy of Arts and Letters, one of New York City’s preferred recording venues, are extraordinarily high. All the nuances of the Brentano’s lean but fruity sound are evident. Antoine Mignon’s notes are evocative and well translated. Ultimately, of course, the performances are what matters. This is playing that, while employing modern instruments, is fully cognizant of the ways and means of 18th-century bows and gut strings. Vibrato is never applied reflexively, but appropriately functions as but one element of an arsenal of expressive devices. Put another way, this is a modern ensemble that has internalized the lessons of period-instrument practice, and with stunning results. These are intellectually cogent performances that never lose sight of the music’s inherent kinesthetic pleasures. Very highly recommended.


FANFARE: Patrick Rucker

For all those lucky enough to attend it, the concert of 11 June 2004 during the Agora Festival at Ircam will remain engraved on their memories as an unforgettable moment of grace, an instant of intense crystallization when, for the length of an evening, we were held in the unceasing grip of naturalness and emotion. This recording tells of that evening. A simple reflection of that sheerly beautiful instant when musicians and listeners abandoned themselves unreservedly to the demands of Jarrell's style, in music that, here, is as delicate as it is spellbinding.

Unless I’ve missed something, this is the first recorded performance of the Magnard Quartet since the Artis Quartet’s tilt at it nearly two decades ago (Accord 220 602). A reading by the estimable Via Nova Quartet may have been offered about the same time, but seems never to have been available domestically. Composed over 1902–03—between Guercoeur and the Hymne à Vénus—and similar in appeal to the symphonies, the Quartet offers a propulsive, substantial first movement, a briskly bracing Sérénade, an extended movement in his familiar funèbre vein, and a frolicsome finale of Danses. Of Magnard’s 21 extant works this is the most difficult to know, by virtue of its compactness, and the one, once known, one may well come to love the best. Which is to say that you will want this more than passable performance. On the other hand, Fauré’s Quartet, his final work, does not lack for recorded performances, though most—the Ysaÿe’s included—run aground on the shoals of stylistic incomprehension. For both composers tautness is all, which puts them immediately at odds with the Ysaÿe’s kinder, gentler, nuance-rife readings. Chez Fauré, this approach clutters his austerity and dims its slow flare of radiance in an effusive mushiness. Magnard is more resistant but does not wholly escape blunting. His abruptness—his notorious brusquerie—was not merely a gesture of concision but a coup de théâtre, a call to order, a demand to listen. It is a closely argued work, and to occlude its fleet directness is to labor its argument. Still, there is enough of the essential Magnard here to make an acceptable introduction—while tracking down the Artis Quartet’s more incisively revelatory performance, lobbying for a reissue of the Via Nova, and pressing for other ensembles to essay it. For idiomatic Fauré, one may have to go back to the 1935 Pro Arte Quartet (Biddulph LAB 105), the Loewenguth Quartet (in an LP collection of French string quartets for Vox, SVBX 670), or—by default—the Miami Quartet as the best among recent issues (Conifer 75605 51291 2). Aeon’s sound is immediate and detailed within a spacious aural frame. With reservations noted, recommended.

Adrian Corleonis, FANFARE

MACHAUT 11 Ballades • Lucien Kandel, dir; Ens Musica Nova • AEON AECD 0982 (75:17 Text and Translation)


De Fortune. Dame se vous m’estes. Esperance. Phyton le mervilleus. Se quanque amours. De triste cuer/Quant vrais/Certes. Il m’est avis. Sans cuer m’en vois/Amis dolens/Dame par vous. Amours me fait desirer. Quant Theseus/Ne quier. Je ne cuit pas. Hoquetus David ANON Pour vous revoir. Sois tard tempre


We have never had a collection devoted only to Machaut’s ballades on a disc until now. While the motets have had more attention recently than any other form, including a set of discs by this same ensemble on another label ( Fanfare 28:1), there are fewer of them than the 42 ballades, the longest list of Machaut’s compositions in any form. (He wrote 235 ballades, the rest not set to music.) Only four of them remain to be recorded, and while that short list has not been further reduced here, the program does give us a few works that needed more satisfactory versions. Only Amours me fait desirer and Quant Theseus (along with the instrumental hocket, which is not a ballade) have been much recorded in the past, and both of them, along with Esperance , have been recorded very nicely on an Ensemble Gilles Binchois disc (not reviewed here). De Fortune, Se quanque amours , and Je ne cuit pas are all on a superb Orlando Consort disc (22:5). Dame se vous m’estes is on the recent Gothic Voices disc (30:4), while Il m’est avis is on a fine Ferrara Ensemble disc (also not reviewed here). The disc concludes with two anonymous virelais (one instrumental) that show Machaut’s influence on the next generation of composers.


So apart from these pieces, there are still three ballades that needed these new interpretations. The four singers and four players render this collection in varied ways. Set for two to four voices, some use a solo voice with instruments on the other parts, others are a cappella vocal renditions, and still others are vocal performance with instrumental doubling. All of the ballades are given with all three strophes. Phyton , sung by a cappella voices, is a notable gain, replacing David Munrow’s incomplete version with one voice and two crumhorns. The other two that are marked improvements over anything up to now are both triple-texted ballades, a different text in each voice. Both are given elegant a cappella performances.


The last decade or so has seen one Machaut disc after another receiving favorable reviews. This is partly due to the performances that preceded those that we hear in this new era, a range that too often dipped sadly below an acceptable level of interpretation. It is also due to the exceptional level that current interpreters have attained. At the rate we are going, it will be some years before we have the complete Machaut, but perhaps it will eventually be satisfactory as well as complete.


FANFARE: J. F. Weber

Philomela, by British composer James Dillon, inspired by Ovid and Sophocles, is his first scenic work. Whether opera or musical theatre, his score gives us an original and intense reading of the Princess of Athens' tragedy. Philomela is a visionary work. While being within the history of music, it invents its forms, its time, its own aesthetic sphere. It is probably for that reason that James Dillon qualifies it: music/théâtre (note the first term in English, the second in French, that authenticates the paternity of this history) so that it does not belong to the history of opera (too long) neither to modern musical theatre (too short). James Dillon imagines a space between Baroque and Noh theatre, a space we can perceive, we can seize immediately, as we contemplate this production. The writing in itself is a kind of metaphor of the myth! It's a cut tongue. For this recording, the best interpreters of our times have been selected. This is one of the major contemporary lyrical successes of the last decade, both innovating and thoroughly gripping.

Musica Nova, with its rich experience performing the ballades and motets of Guillaume de Machaut, set out to rewrite the book on his most famous and emblematic work: the so-called Messe de Nostre Dame. The very elaborate construction of the mass and its strange and subtle harmonies win the admiration of all. But do we really know what its true sound was? Though we cannot be quite sure, our research into the 14th-century theory of musica ficta, led by specialist Gérard Geay, has allowed us to come close, opening up an unheard sound world. In order to perform this music the singers worked from various 14th-century manuscript sources. They used the reading techniques of that era in an attempt to stay as close as possible to the phrasing and vocal movement that Machaut would have had in mind. Reading from the manuscript places the singer in a world of long note values with ternary divisions (modus perfectus), which automatically suggests a longer breath and a more spacious performance. Machaut's mass alternates between two styles of composition: the conductus (Gloria and Credo), a 13th-century legacy in which all voices follow the same rhythm, and the isorhythmic motet (Kyrie, Sanctus, Agnus Dei, Ite missa est, and the final Amen in the both the Gloria and Credo), which is specific to the Ars Nova.

PLORER, GEMIR, CRIER • Antoine Guerber, cond; Diabolus in Musica • AEON AECD 1226 (57:22 Text and Translation)


LA RUE Plorer, gemir, crier/ Requiem. OBRECHT Missa Sicut spina rosam. JOSQUIN DES PREZ Nymphes des bois. BUSNOIS In hydraulis. LUPI Ergo ne conticuit


Guillaume Crétin’s reputation survives primarily today on the basis of only one of his poems, the Lament on the Death of the Late Ockeghem, Treasurer of St. Martin of Tours . In it, he follows a much older tradition of couching his narrative in the form of a supposed dream. In it the great composers of the past—among which Crétin includes Dufay, Busnois, Dunstaple, Binchois, Lannoy, Pasquin, and others—assembled to welcome Ockeghem to their ranks with a performance of the Missa Mi-mi . Then he exhorts composers still living to weep musically for their dead comrade. Here, too, he isn’t hesitant in naming names, all of them well known then, several of them restored now to at least a measure of their old reputations: Josquin, Agricola, Brumel, and Compère are just a few. Whether it was Crétin’s work, or another, contemporaneous lament, Nymphes des bois by Jehan Molinet, or simply a high regard for the talents of the man who was considered among the foremost musicians of his time by many of his Franco-Flemish contemporaries, several of Ockeghem’s contemporaries gave musical vent to sorrow.


And that’s the theme of this disc. Molinet mentions Pierre de la Rue, and it’s the latter’s polytextural motet, Plorer, gemir, crier et braire, set against the Requiem eternam that leads off the program. (The juxtaposition of sudden harmonic shifts, swiftly moving sequences, and deliberately spare textures creates a paradoxical effect, mixing lightness and grief.) Similarly, Josquin provides a polytextural motet, one that sets Molinet’s lament, again against the Requiem ’s theme. Lupus’s less adventurous but well-constructed work utilizes for its text an elegiac lament upon Ockeghem’s death written by Erasmus; the literary and philosophical giant also studied music with Obrecht. (Erasmus is curiously ambivalent in his writings on a number of musical matters, and states in “The Education of a Christian Prince” that children should only be allowed to hear and be instructed in music of high quality, since ingrained expectations are very hard to break.)


The last two works on this album aren’t laments, but tributes to the living. Obrecht himself contributed a mass that was originally thought to follow upon Ockeghem’s death in 1497, but a stylistic analysis by Rob Wegman (in his “Born for the Muses: the Life and Masses of Jacob Obrecht”) places it earlier—given the use of a plainchant associated with the Nativity of the Blessed Virgin on September 8, possibly a celebration of that day in 1484, during Obrecht’s brief service at the Cathedral of Cambrai. It is recognizably of an older generation than the motets of la Rue and Josquin, less concerned with expressive effect as we perceive it than with a remarkable display of contrapuntal craft, and the integration of various Ockeghem quotes. Finally, there’s the mercurial Busnois, who rose to the post of subdeacon at the Church of St. Martin in Tours, where Ockeghem was treasurer at the time. It’s worth considering that the second part to his extravagant In hydraulis begins with a motif (on the words, “Haec Ockeghem”) that is almost exactly mirrored in the superius of an Ockeghem motet, Ut heremita solus . As we don’t have dates for either work, whoever wrote his motet last presumably meant it as a compliment to the other.


Diabolus in Musica has been reviewed in these pages often enough by J.F. Weber to require no introduction. The ensemble here consists of 10 musicians: two female mezzos, two male altos, four tenors, and two basses. Most selections require far less, such as the four singers deployed in the la Rue, Lupus, and Busnois; and that’s especially appreciated in the last of the three pieces, where it contributes to a degree of clarity that works hand in glove with the composer’s contrapuntal and rhythmic cleverness. The Obrecht Mass is only the second recording of the work, and utilizes eight male voices—the same lineup as János Bali and the A.N.S. Choir employ (Hungaroton 32192). Weber liked that earlier performance ( Fanfare 27:6), but I prefer this one both because the engineering is less reverberant, making for clearer lines, and because Diabolus in Musica’s director, Antoine Guerber, is less inclined to draw back and lengthen notes. I understand Bali’s desire to do so. All intellectual brilliance to one side, the Missa Sicut rosa spinam is a work of extraordinary lyricism; but this version moves it along at what I perceive as a better pace.


With full texts in Latin, French, and English, strongly recommended.


FANFARE: Barry Brenesal

LIGETI Strings Quartets Nos. 1 and 2. Sonata for Solo Cello • Qrt Béla • AEON 1332 (50:20)


Quatour Béla has named its disc of Ligeti’s string quartets after the First, “Métamorphoses nocturnes.” That may seem a strange choice, given that the Second is the more iconic, and certainly the more historically significant, but it is apt, as the First Quartet is the real revelation here. That’s not to say that either the Second Quartet or the cello sonata is found wanting—the quality is exceptionally high throughout—but where other recordings of these works demonstrate a clear hierarchy, the Béla’s account presents the First Quartet as fully the equal of its successor.


The quiet and mysterious opening of the First Quartet rarely taxes performers, and from the opening bars alone it would be very difficult to separate out the great recordings from the also-rans. But then comes a sudden sforzando , and rarely have Ligeti’s shock tactics have been as effective as they are here. This account is all about contrasts, with the many sudden changes of tempo, dynamic, and texture presented as starkly and brutally as possible. And for all its undoubted sophistication, the work really responds to this approach. Its gradual unfolding—a metamorphosis by thematic transformation across a single-movement, 20-minute span—is punctuated and delineated by these outbursts. Even more impressively, the tonal control and balance between the instruments is always maintained, even at the loudest dynamics. There is lyricism here too, and a certain folk character to the quieter melodic music, but that isn’t really the priority for these players, who sensibly avoid over-interpreting the more naïve passages.


The Ligeti quartets are now well served on disc, particularly by young ensembles specializing in new music, and Quatour Béla follow in the footsteps of similar groups in recent years, including the Artemis (reviewed in 29:5), Parker (33:5), JACK, and Keller (37:2) Quartets. Although I won’t claim to have heard them all, I will express a preference for a more senior ensemble, namely the Arditti Quartet, whose 1994 recording (Sony 62306) has long seemed, to me at least, the definitive account. This new recording is the first I’ve heard that seriously challenges the Ardittis’. But these are very different readings, and the qualities that Quatour Béla brings put both works in a different light. That sense of immediacy and total immersion in the First Quartet is as much a product of the sound engineering as it is of the playing. The recording quality here is exceptional, better even than that on the Ardittis’ account. The miking is not too close, and there is warmth to the sound, but each of the instruments comes through with absolute clarity, and the wide stereo array places each of them at a definite and separate point around your living room.


The Second Quartet is given a reading just as fine as that of the First—though perhaps it doesn’t pull away quite as far from the competition this time, as the Second is the work that most other ensembles give the greater attention. But, again, the wide dynamic range, the excellent ensemble, the responsiveness of the players to the composer’s sudden changes of direction, and the crystal-clear audio all add up to make for a compelling account. The pizzicato third movement is particularly impressive. Unlike the Ardittis’ recording, where the more homogeneous sound makes the gradual phase shifts sound like a single, increasingly dysfunctional mechanism, the autonomy of the individual players granted by the superior audio here instead gives it a more heterogeneous character—makes it sound more like chamber music. Conversely, the brutality of the cluster writing in the fourth movement is all the more oppressive for the unity of intent the players display, and again for the immediacy and clarity of the recorded sound.


It’s not a perfect account, and in one or two crucial regards the Ardittis’ retain the upper hand. Much of the writing in the outer movements involves pp, sul ponticello , tremolo effects on artificial harmonics, and in my experience only the Ardittis’ can make that sort of device sound truly musical. There is also a sense of poise lacking, a common failing with many younger ensembles approaching this music, but again something that makes the Arditti Quartet stand out. The last movement in particular needs to express a paradoxical mix of languorous stillness and episodic progression. And then it needs to disappear off at the very end, melting away in one of those scurrying tremolo effects. Quatour Béla doesn’t quite manage either, and so the conclusion loses some of its effect.


That’s a minor criticism though, and is the only thing that keeps this recording from taking the top spot from the Ardittis’. The two works together come to about 40 minutes, and choosing a filler can be tricky. This time round, the Quartet’s cellist, Luc Dedreuil, gives us the early Sonata for Solo Cello. This too is a fine reading, although of a much more straightforward work. Again, the sonics are excellent and the playing is both committed and engaging.


An excellent recording all round and highly recommended, especially for the First Quartet, which, these players conclusively demonstrate, is anything but juvenilia.


FANFARE: Gavin Dixon

'There is not one interpretation of these motets that clashes, not a single moment of lassitude in these two discs.' Philippe Vendrix/Diapason Complete Motets of Machaut (re-release) Since the beauty, richness and diversity of such an oeuvre made it impossible to choose amongst the 23 motets by the Canon of Reims, the Musica Nova ensemble decided to embark on the adventure of a complete recording. Two years of work and research were necessary for putting this programme together, as the musicians strove for an in-depth approach to each motet in terms of both style and an instrumentation made possible by the very structure of the ensemble. This disc, which had a resounding critical success when first released, offers the first complete translation in modern French of Guillaume de Machaut's motets. An indispensable set!

FELDMAN Patterns in a Chromatic Field. 1 Projection I. Composition—8 Little Pieces. 1 Intersection IV. Duration II 1 • Arne Deforce (vc); Yutaka Oya (pn) 1 • AEON 977 (2 CDs: 105:31)


Morton Feldman’s Patterns in a Chromatic Field (also known as Untitled Composition for Cello and Piano ) dates from the early 1980s, a period when the composer was beginning his ultimate obsession with the construction of large-scale works (in this performance, 88 minutes) from the repetition and juxtaposition of small, often unrelated events. These might be brief episodes of whispery cello phrases and chiming piano chords, stuttering motifs, or sustained notes that rub against one another with a soothing friction. In such a stark, seemingly static context, these events may suggest visual shapes woven into a gradually changing musical fabric—hence the “patterns” of the title. With its dry, undemonstrative demeanor, the music is not flattering to instrumentalists; nevertheless, cellist Deforce and pianst Oya are able to sustain tension throughout extended periods of low dynamics and subtle detail, growing ever so slightly but increasingly dramatic as the unannounced, unanticipated end approaches.


Appended to this major work are four of Feldman’s earliest scores, each of which gives the player(s) various degrees of freedom and responsibility in the realization of the music. Projection I (1950) and Intersection IV (1951), both for solo cello, are graphic scores in which the number of notes in a phrase, relative range of pitch, and approximate duration are provided to offer the performers what Feldman called “windows of opportunities” to project sounds into space. Duration II (1960) supplies the cellist and pianist with notes on conventional staves, but without stems or bar lines to determine timing and phrasing. Finally, Composition—8 Little Pieces (1950) is an oddity, an unpublished and previously unrecorded score which might be the Composition for two pianos and cello of that year listed in Feldman’s catalog of works. There is no description or explanation of the work in the booklet’s program notes, which are excerpted from Feldman’s own writings. In any case, though the Webernesque concision of these works makes Patterns in a Chromatic Field seem Mahlerian by comparison, the relationship between the instruments, the nature of the harmonic language, and the attention to detail make all of this music, early or late, regardless of method of composition, undeniably and distinctively Feldman’s own.


FANFARE: Art Lange

With Nunes what arouses my admiration and boundless gratitude, even more than the ability to invent and fill us with wonder, is the encounter between a very lofty idea of music, capable of producing the most intense inner emotions and artistic joys, and an immediacy of perception resulting from total sensuality of the instrumental gesture. - Christophe Desjardins

Classical Music

The English translation excellently acted gives this fiery Peer new appeal.

Based on concerts the Suisse Romande Orchestra gave in Geneva and Lausanne, Guillaume Tourniaire's performance of the Benestad/Andersen critical edition of the score (essentially the 26 numbers given at the play's 1876 premiere) first appeared in 2005 (A/05). In my Gramophone Collection piece on Peer Gynt in November of that year I would have hailed it unreservedly as the best complete version of Grieg's theatre music had the dialogue and melodramas not been spoken in French. Now those spoken passages have been rendered into English, in a translation by Stephen Taylor which resonates without either period whimsy or banal updating.

The linking narrations and filleting of the play by Main Perroux have been made with sharp knowledge of the Ibsen drama and of what works in concert and on disc. The national characteristics of the actors intriguingly alter the feel of the piece. While Lambert Wilson and his French colleagues are more distanced, Brechtian and mysterious, the British trio immediately embrace a warmer, more comic naturalism. Alex Jennings's voice grows from rough Ulster into an assumed English RP as Peer travels the world; Derek Jacobi is a cunning mix of spooky and funny as the Boyg, here called the Great Obstacle, and no less effective in 10 other parts; Haydn Gwynne hops with enjoyable confidence across the age and sanity barriers from Peer's mother to his various girl friends.

Tourniaire has as much of an eye on the drama as the exceptional discs of excerpts under Beecham (EMI) and Masur (Philips). He has intuited and delivered a true Grieg style from his orchestra, alert, light, swift but not afraid to punch home the ironies (of the Trolls' various numbers) and the intentionally noisy stage effect climaxes (like the Act 5 shipwreck music). The two big melodramas ("Peer and the Obstacle" and "Night Scene") — perhaps the most compelling reasons for getting to know the complete score — find Grieg at his most progressive and inventive and Tourniaire paces them beautifully. Even his rits and rails in the tricky little vocal numbers of Peer's African sojourn in Act 4 come off to a tee.

With English-speaking listeners now as well catered for as French ones, Aeon should seriously consider a Norwegian version, even retaining Perroux's taut narrative material. The Ole Kristian Ruud/Bergen BIS Norwegian set (A105) is authentically self-recommending but it lacks the special fire and imagination of Tourniaire's.

-- Mike Ashman, Gramophone [3/2007]

What is fascinating in the music of Pascal Dusapin is the unrestrained energy that radiates from his music, the compact and radical intensity of the sound structures and the clear sense of form of the music in which a singular expressivity is achieved, where the voice of the ‘other’ — the otherness of the cello or clarinet — is expressed. Arne Deforce is renowned for his passionate and exceptional performances of contemporary and experimental music. His inventive programmes explore new musical forms of expression in which the act of an uninhibited creative listening is privileged. In this album, his interpretation is filled with a pure energy, an authentic and personal sound universe that is developed in highly expressive structures of sound and performed with an unbelievable energy that is both ferocious and joyous. Clarinetist Benjamin Dieltjens is mainly active as a chamber music player (on historical instruments as well as in the classical and new repertoire) and is regularly invited as such at many international festivals. In 2008 he was invited to be principal clarinet at the Royal Concertgebouw Orchestra Amsterdam.