With Hail! Bright Cecilia, Henry Purcell, herald of the British Baroque, pays tribute to the patron saint of music through a score widely regarded as one of his masterpieces. Composed in 1692, this ode reflects both the artistic effervescence of 17th-century England and the central role of music in society at the time. Vincent Dumestre and Le Poeme Harmonique reveal the full expressive richness of Purcell's writing in a performance where jubilant brilliance, lyrical delicacy, and dramatic contrasts unfold with infectious vitality. Alternating between recitatives, solo arias, and sumptuous choruses, the score showcases Purcell's mastery of musical dramaturgy, balancing orchestral refinement with controlled theatricality.
Armide was Lully and Quinault's last tragedie lyrique: undoubtedly Quinault's finest dramatic achievement, and the culmination of the tragedie en musique conceived by Lully, who died the year after it's creation. Never has language appeared so beautiful and tragic in Lully's music, and the drama of this Christian knight falling in love with the sorceress who refuses to kill him was so deeply felt that it remained on stage for a century! Here, Vincent Dumestre passionately conducts Lully's last masterpiece, whose eponymous character, played by the immense Stephanie D'Oustrac, never ceases to bewitch us.
This is the story of Phaéton, valiant driver of the Sun's chariot, led here by Vincent Dumestre and Benjamin Lazar, armed with a rich partnership of two decades of Lullyist cooperation. Just like at the time, they will make the Versailles Opera resonate with this production of this flamboyant tragédie lyrique which was first presented in Perm in Russia in 2018. Phaëton is a tragédie en musique in a prologue and five acts by Jean-Baptiste Lully. Philippe Quinault wrote the French libretto after a story from Ovid's Metamorphoses. It can be read as an allegorical depiction of the punishment awaiting those mortals who dare to raise themselves as high as the "sun" (i.e. The Sun King). Phaëton was the first lyric tragedy of Lully and Quinault to receive it's world premiere at the Palace of Versailles, where it was given without stage machinery on or about 6 January 1683. The Paris Opera also performed it at the Théâtre du Palais-Royal (beginning on 27 April), where it was very successful with the general public.
This reissue is a very useful reminder that there is much more to the world of early seventeenth century Florence than just the great work of Monteverdi, who composed Orfeo as a court opera in 1607. Sung drama was a special development in Florence, and music lovers looked for the right combination between poetry and music. The role of the camerate would have considerable significance in that development, which would lead, in full development, to opera as we know it.
There are special problems of setting words to music which remain potent for composers of all times. Is the priority music or text? In a preface of 1605, Monteverdi contrasted prima prattica with seconda prattica. In the former, the word must subordinate itself to the music, with emotional compass limited by musical values. In the latter, things are the other way about (a bit of a simplification, but sound enough), even if the expressiveness of the text means an unevenness in balance and harmony. Monteverdi’s Orfeo exemplifies seconda prattica. So too, in its own way, does Belli’s L’Orfeo Dolente, of 1616, the main piece on this recording, supplemented by extracts from contemporary works.
Belli’s work is not an opera in the sense that Monteverdi’s Orfeo is. Rather, it has the character of incidental music to Tasso’s play, Arminta, a set of numbers to draw out and heighten the key moments of the drama. The text of these verses is not by Tasso, but by Gabriello Chiabrera. Belli is today not well-known, but he was clearly a composer of distinctive voice; he worked at the Florentine Basilica of San Lorenzo from 1610 until 1613.
But this music is not just a piece of archaeological interest; it stands on its own very well in performances as varied, as musical and attractive as those on this disc. Singers are uniformly fine, both individually and in ensemble, with good diction and security of tone. Performances are informed, both musically and historically, as one would expect from such fine musicians.
Versailles is remembered for its court, its atmosphere, its music, and its splendor which defined a monument with an incomparably rich history. The works associated with the palace have traveled down the centuries, and today represent a precious part of the Western music tradition. In this release, Alpha retraces the musical life of the unique and luminous universe of Versailles. Le Poeme Harmonique, Café Zimmermann, Capriccio Stravagante, and many others invite themselves into the company of Jean-Baptiste Lully, Marc-Antoine Charpentier, and Jean-Henry d’Anglebert and share with us for a few hours the sumptuous concerts that made Versailles a place like no other.
For more than a century, from the last Valois kings to the early years of the reign of Louis XIV, the air de cour was truly the emblematic genre of French secular music. The term bears witness to the influence on and transformation by worldly and literate circles of vocal genres of popular origin such as the vaudeville, combined with Italian influences (the villanella), based on the principles of a simple strophic musical setting that facilitated understanding of the poetic text. Three composers dominated the production of airs de cour in the reigns of Henry IV and Louis XIII, bringing the genre to it's peak: Pierre Guédron (1565-1620), Antoine Boesset (1587-1643) and Étienne Moulinié (1599-1676). To mark the twentieth anniversary of his ensemble, Vincent Dumestre has chosen to celebrate the air de cour by bringing together excerpts from his five recordings devoted to the genre. A book accompanies this double album, including an article written by Thomas Leconte of the Centre de Musique Baroque de Versailles, a rich array of illustrations and an article on the historical context by Alexandre Maral, Curator General at the Musée National du Château de Versailles.
Cour: Airs De Coeur Francais Della Fin Du Xvie Siecle
Alpha
CD
$20.99Oct 30, 2015
In this new release, Vincent Dumestre’s Le Poème Harmonique once again immerses us in the France of the second half of the 16th century, which witnessed the emergence of new centres of artistic activity. These ‘bourgeois’ societies were initiated by patron princes concerned with building their prestige through the arts and letters just as much as by arms. At the same time, refined circles held by cultivated women enabled them to rub shoulders with the leading poets of the time, as well as musicians sensitive to humanist research, all profiting from a context propitious to the invention of new artistic forms and practices. As usual, Vincent Dumestre, uncontested master of these repertoires, has surrounded himself with the finest singers and instrumentalists, a loyal troupe that exhumes unusual musical treasures, letting us share in them.
Lalande: Tenebrae / Dumestre, Lefilliatre, Le Poeme Harmonique
Alpha
CD
$11.99Aug 24, 2018
In 1680, Francois Chaperon, maître de musique of the Sainte-Chapelle, entrusted the setting of some verses from the Lamentations of Jeremiah to Michel Richard de Lalande and Jean-Fery Rebel, Lalande’s brother in law. The Lecons de Tenebres of 1680, now lost, probably provided material for the Tenebrae compositions that have come down to us. Although Lalande had written his Lecons and his Miserere for solo voice for the nuns of the convent of the Assumption, they were actually sung- like many of his works for female voices- by his daughters. The Lecons de Tenebres and Miserere must have therefore been composed some time before 1711, for that year Jeanne and Marie Anne de Lalande died in the smallpox epidemic. For this interpretation of the Miserere, the musicians have chosen the version presented in Brossard’s autograph manuscript of 1711, in which the alternate verses are sung by three voices in faux-bourdon, a practice that was still in vogue at that time in France. Fragmentary notation for a treble instrument is found throughout this manuscript version, thus attesting the practice, in the seventeenth and eighteenth centuries, of improvising the countermelody at sight.
An ancient hero, a dragon, a young goddess: love and glory are at the heart of Lully's first opera, first performed in front of Louis XIV. As in his previous works - divertissements, ballets de cour and comédies- ballets - Lully makes the voices and the orchestra sparkle, multiplying the pieces which stand out and that were appealing to the court. But with the help of the librettist Philippe Quinault, he introduced the dramatic force of French classical tragédie in an exclusively musical work: and here the audience was bewitched by the mythical love stories so sumptuously portrayed. The first tragic heroes, the first great love duets, the first tears from the audience: the tragédie-lyrique, this opera in the French manner, was born, and thanks to it, until his death in 1687, Lully would never cease to delight. Vincent Dumestre brilliantly resuscitates this seminal work, thus celebrating with dignity the three hundred and fifty years of the Académie royale de musique!
Le musiche di Bellerofonte Castaldi / Laurens, Dumestre, Le Poeme Harmonique
Alpha
CD
$11.99Sep 30, 2016
After the success of the first fourteen reissues, which restored to the limelight some of the gems of the early music repertory in the catalogues of our labels, here are fourteen new titles to allow listeners to renew acquaintance with further treasures of the Renaissance and Baroque (and even a journey through time thanks to Raphaël Imbert’s album Bach Coltrane), performed by some of the leading interpreters of the genre; most of these discs won one or more awards on their first release. As with the first series, the artists have been asked to contribute to the booklets, in which, with a few years’ hindsight, they talk about their conception of the works and how they went about recording them. The photographers of the Magnum agency illustrate the covers of the series with their work; this time the common design element is the colour yellow.In addition to the 13 titles shown below, the album FIRENZE 161 by LE POEME HARMONIQUE, VINCENT DUMESTRE, will also be reissued.
Monteverdi: Testamento - Vespro della Madonna 1643
Château de Versailles Spectacles
CD
$26.99Nov 29, 2024
At his arrival in Venice in 1613, Monteverdi, ever the tireless worker, finally found a challenge that suited him: he would compose every day, both sacred and secular music, for the glory of God or his patrons. In the twilight of his life, he gathered his works into a corpus, intended to inspire musicians during the celebration of religious services. This recording is a musical testament to his carefully preserved life's work. Vincent Dumestre and Le Poeme Harmonique pay tribute to the brilliant composer who set the tone for all 17th-century sacred music.
Mon amant de Saint-Jean / d'Oustrac, Dumestre, Le Poème Harmonique
Alpha
CD
$20.99Aug 25, 2023
Fascinated by the interplay of echoes from one past to another, Vincent Dumestre and Stéphanie d’Oustrac found an affinity in the project Mon Amant de Saint-Jean, their very first collaboration, and aimed to make it a unique musical adventure: a recital in which the atmosphere of the chansons of the Années Folles infuses early music with its sweet madness. In 1904, the great cabaret singer Yvette Guilbert was invited to the home of the Casadesus family, the founders of the Société des Instruments Anciens (Early instrument society): the Baroque fraternised with the café-concert. Around the same time, in the revue Paris qui chante, an aria by Scarlatti rubbed shoulders with the coarse language of Aristide Bruant and Paulin, while Gaston Dumestre, a singer at the cabaret Le Chat Noir (and one of Vincent’s ancestors!), sang chansons réalistes while accompanying himself on the theorbo presented to him by Oscar II of Sweden: ‘It is in language that we must seek the common driving force. These cabaret singers relished a very special flavour, a vigour, a raciness in the words of the Baroque era’, concludes Vincent Dumestre.
Locatelli, Razzi & Vivaldi: Nisi Dominus / Zaïcik, Dumestre, Le poème harmonique
Alpha
CD
$20.99Sep 09, 2022
In the seventeenth century, the Ospedale della Pietà in Venice took in young orphan girls who received advanced musical instruction. The concerts given there attracted visitors from all over the world, curious to hear these divine voices which remained invisible, since the girls performed hidden behind the grilles of the chapel gallery. Vivaldi became Maestro de’ Concerti of the Pietà in 1714, and it was his pupils who performed his famous Nisi Dominus. Today they are succeeded by the mezzo-soprano Eva Zaïcik, who brings out the full poignancy of the aria ‘Cum dederit’. Another motet by Vivaldi, Invicti bellate, also composed for the Pietà, features in this program planned and conducted by Vincent Dumestre. He invites us on a musical journey centered on the figure of woman and on divine praise, with composers awaiting discovery such as Serafino Razzi (1534-1619) and Soto de Langa (1531-1611).
In 1643 in Venice, Cavalli’s new opera caused a sensation among the audience of the Teatro San Cassiano. L’Egisto takes its name from the piece’s main character, an Arcadian shepherd who is misled by an ambiguous inscription into believing his love is lost. A succession of misunderstandings ensues, along with spectacular pieces of music, a scene of madness and a descent into the Underworld for this would-be Orpheus searching for his Eurydice. The sumptuousness of the music, which masterfully illustrates the emotions involved in a love quadrangle, offers Vincent Dumestre and his cast the opportunity to paint with dazzling colours and virtuoso strokes for this first great labyrinth of Baroque sentiment.
Cavalli, Lully et al.: The Royal Wedding of Louis XIV / Dumestre, Le Poème Harmonique, Choir of La Tempête
Château de Versailles Spectacles
CD
$20.99May 27, 2022
The wedding of Louis XIV with the Infanta of Spain, on 9 June 1660, was an exceptional event, sealing the peace between two monarchies that had been opposed for centuries. The 21-year-old King set off on a journey lasting thirteen months to cross and discover his kingdom: 15,000 people and 8,000 horses, 3,200 km in 95 stages, culminating in a wedding in Saint Jean de Luz! The greatest festivities took place during the wedding ceremony, then on the journey of their Majesties, for their solemn entry into Paris and finally for the opera given in the Louvre in honor of the bride and groom! The finest composers contributed to the celebrations: the King’s trumpets opened the concert, while the church galleries hosted Du Mont’s symphony, organ and motets; finally, the most beautiful excerpts from Cavalli’s Xerxes and Lully’s accompanying ballets celebrated the Royal Wedding of Louis XIV through opera. Vincent Dumestre brings to life the musical splendors of the wedding of the century!
Includes:
Jean-Baptiste Lully - Sonneries pour les trompettes du Roi; Entrée pour la Maison de France; Les Espagnols; Les Basques; Motet pour la Paix (Jubilate Deo)
Guillaume-Gabriel Nivers - Livre d'Orgue contenant Cent Pièces: Plein jeu du 3e ton & Récit de cromorne du troisième ton
Francesco Cavalli - Magnificat; Xerse: Lasciatemi morire
Juan Hidalgo - Celos aun del aire matan; Dos zagalas venian
REVIEW
“The wedding of Louis XIV and Maria Theresa of Austria was the event of the century!” trumpets the website material for this disc. The King’s various wars might have been even more important events, but as royal weddings go, the one on 9 June 1660 was certainly a big one, not least politically, which for 17th century royals usually meant dynastically. Maria Theresa was the Infanta of Spain, so the marriage brought peace to monarchies long opposed.
Never mind the title and the recording location. The knot was not actually tied in Versailles. The 21-year old King first went on a year’s royal progress around France to see his new kingdom, and the Infanta of Spain by tradition could not leave her country until she was married. So the borderland of the Basque country was the venue and the celebrations – of marriage and a peace treaty – were held in Saint-Jean-de-Luz, before the new couple progressed through France to Versailles, where yet more celebrations were held.
Music accompanied the royal couple along the way as well. Couperin and Lully tagged along at times, and there was Lully’s now mostly lost Ballet de Toulouse written for one of the stages en route. Vincent Dumestre and Le Poème Harmonique have assembled here just over an hour’s programme selected from across these extended festivities; the exact works used at any point are often uncertain. Matthieu Franchin’s excellent booklet says that the disc “offers […] a selection of music from among all those that may have accompanied, directly or indirectly, the festivities taking place within the vicinity of this wedding”.
The pieces are arranged in five sections to reflect the ceremonial sequence: Aux portes du temple, Entrée des délégations, Célébration de la paix, Mariage and Réjouissance et ballet des nations. The programme opens with a regal sound of some splendour with trumpets and drums of Lully’s fanfare “Sonneries pour les trompettes du Roi”, and these instruments feature quite often in later parts. Couperin’s austere organ prelude follows, to remind us we are in an ecclesiastical building. Lully’s ballet music offers dances suitable for Spaniards and then Basques, the former with guitars and castanets. Veillot’s “O filii e filiae” launches the celebration of the peace with simple and attractive monophony, first with women’s voices solo and choral, with the men joining later.
Lully’s Jubilate Deo sequence, also known as his “Motet de la Paix”, is one of two larger works on the disc included in their entirety. This excellent motet is known to have been much admired by the King, who commanded several performances. It opens with a fine five-part instrumental prelude (or “symphony”), and the choral writing is at times richer still. The choir Compagnie de la Tempête sound thoroughly idiomatic, as do the vocal soloists, none of whose names I knew but who all have attractive voices and the right style and scale for the era.
Two organ pieces by Nivers and a Sinfonia by Rossi lead the sequence for the Marriage itself, which is dominated by the other extended work on the disc, Cavalli’s Magnificat. Every time I hear an unfamiliar piece by the great Venetian, he sounds in the same league as Monteverdi, and so it is here. There is an impressive range of music within the work, plenty of praise and joy of course, but also a brief but searching Et misericordia (“His mercy continues from generation to generation”). The livelier sections are sung and played with impressive agility.
The final Réjouissance (rejoicing) brings secular song and opera, ending with a contribution from the Spanish side. Hidalgo’s opera was commissioned to celebrate the peace and marriage, and was the first Spanish opera, or possibly the first that survived. It makes a light-hearted and jolly close, of the sort not only royal weddings require. We are not quite eavesdropping on history, as this exact sequence of pieces is acknowledged as speculative. But in its spirit of intelligent and informed reconstruction, it is to be celebrated.
The disc has added to my collection no fewer than six names I had not known, and the music is worth hearing. Perhaps it is not quite, in the end, a sequence greater than the sum of its parts, so that one might listen selectively on subsequent playings of the disc. But the standards of execution under Vincent Dumestre’s direction are very good, justifying the high reputation of Le Poème Harmonique, whose earlier discs have won much praise. The booklet, on which I have drawn much here, is very informative, as it must be for this programme. The sound is atmospheric, doubtless reflecting the acoustic of the Royal Chapel of the Château de Versailles, and captures the tang of the colourful old instruments.
Lully: Le Bourgeois gentilhomme / Dumestre, Le Poeme Harmonique
Château de Versailles Spectacles
CD
$20.99Jan 28, 2022
In 1670, Molière and Lully presented to the King Le Bourgeois Gentilhomme, a sumptuous Comédie-Ballet performed by Molière's Troupe, with musicians conducted by Lully, ballets by Pierre Beauchamp, scenery by Carlo Vigarani and Turkish costumes by the Chevalier d'Arvieux. The work was inspired by the ambassador Soliman Musta Aga-Feraga, whom Louis XIV had just kept waiting for long weeks before receiving him, provoking his exasperation which amused the King and the courtiers’ sneer, the whole of Paris mocking the outlandish mores of the envoys of the Great Turk. The idea came to Molière of a plot based on fake Turks, ridiculing a Bourgeois aspiring to nobility: thus, a masterpiece was born, with the dazzling Cérémonie Turque, and at the end a sumptuous Ballet des Nations. The magnificent music of this pillar of French theatre is recorded here in its entirety for the first time by Vincent Dumestre: Glory be to Lully and to Molière!
Pagliardi: Caligula / Dumestre, Le Poeme Harmonique [Blu-ray]
Alpha
Blu-Ray
$34.99Sep 28, 2018
“From Suetonius to Camus, Caligula has constantly inspired historians, poets and playwrights, to the point of becoming a myth: that of madness steeped in cruelty…Caligula raves, Caligula is crazed, but his gaze is that of the visionary, his derangement of the senses is an opening towards the fantastical. Now it is precisely that fantastical (and also comical) dimension that is inscribed in the fable set to music Giovanni Pagliardi in Venice in 1672, which Vincent Dumestre brings back to life here. But above all, this portrait of Caligula as a hero of the impossible, a showman of wonders, has been rounded off with an idea that suddenly seems self-evident: Caligula, and all the characters around him, could only be “wooden actors”, puppets. The traditional Palermitan pupo – used in the famous puppet shows – is manipulated in full view of the audience by means of iron rods fixed to the head of the wooden character and one of the arms of the pupo, especially for the fight scenes, while the other arm is connected by a thread. The specific genius of the pupi is not mimetic, as in Venice, but poetic. Or, even better: epic. There is only one surviving representative of this popular art backed up by learned culture: Mimmo Cuticchio. Born in 1948, he learnt his skills from his father Giacomo, through practical experience of performances both itinerant, going from village to village, and local, in Palermo.” (Alexandra Rübner and Vincent Dumestre)
14 distinct titles introduce this exciting new series uniting the finest Alpha and ZZT Baroque recordings. Discover - or rediscover - universally known works as well as world premiere recordings of rarities. Newly conducted artist interviews allow for fresh perspectives on their recordings. All releases, digipak in format with trilingual booklets, feature photographs by great (Magnum Cooperative) contemporary artists adorning the covers and a strong 'queen of colors' scheme, bringing to mind gods, kings, warriors, the devil, life, violence and death... Themes omnipresent in Baroque art!
The Symphonies for the king's soupers are emblematic of Versailles and of the greatest king in the world. What other Prince would assemble the 24 king's violins and the winds of his royal écurie for his meal? With the luxury of an opera orchestra, here we have Louis XIV at his table with music every day. From the chapel to the apartments, the whole château resounded with Lalande's music. His Majesty prayed, ate, laughed and wept with it. Vincent Dumestre has passionately resurrected this royal, gastronomical and therefore opulent music.
Works of Lorenzo Allegri (1573-1648) and Giovanni Battista Buonamente (d. 1642)] intersperse the music of Monteverdi coeval Domenico Belli d. 1627), a mysterious figure with a capricious personality who left behind some rather startling music.
Formed in 1998, Le Poème Harmonique, led by their artistic director Vincent Dumestre, center its artistic activity around 17th- early 18th century vocal and instrumental music, being often enriched by interaction with other artistic disciplines in performance.
This recording provides an opportunity to discover a forgotten Baroque operatic treasure: a zarzuela, the key dramatic and musical genre of the Spanish Golden Age. Sumptuous choruses, poignant arias, and folksongs blend in a rich and spectacular narrative, whose music was falsely attributed to Antonio Literes before Sebastián Durón (1660-1716) was acknowledged as its composer in 2009! Another peculiarity of the work is that it is sung by seven sopranos, who are even given the roles of Apollo, Neptune and the monster Triton. Only the part of an old man, the seer Proteus, is assigned to a tenor. Ana Quintans in the title role, Isabelle Druet, Anthea Pichanick, Caroline Meng, and Cyril Auvity are among the cast of this colorful zarzuela, whose modern stage premiere in 2019 enjoyed great success.
![Pagliardi: Caligula / Dumestre, Le Poeme Harmonique [Blu-ray]](http://arkivmusic.com/cdn/shop/files/3820902.jpg?v=1786835545&width=800)
![Pagliardi: Caligula / Dumestre, Le Poeme Harmonique [Blu-ray]](http://arkivmusic.com/cdn/shop/files/81dYidwfNHL.jpg?v=1786835545&width=800)
![Pagliardi: Caligula / Dumestre, Le Poeme Harmonique [Blu-ray]](http://arkivmusic.com/cdn/shop/files/3820902.jpg?v=1786835545&width=400)
