Destinées
This album featuring the core group of Sophie de Bardonnèche (violin), Lucile Boulanger (gamba), and Justin Taylor (harpsichord) feature works by female French composers. The ensemble is augmented on several tracks by additional musicians, including Louise Ayrton, Marta Paramo, Clément Bartel-Genin, and Hanna Salzenstein.
The program is de Bardonnèche’s first solo album, featuring many pieces that are heard here for the first time. Ten different composers are represented, including the most famous, Élisabeth Jacquet de la Guerre. The recording was made in February 2024 at the Allemande church in Paris. Churches are maybe not the best location for chamber music, but Hughes Deschaux does a good job at getting us close to the musicians and achieving nearly a chamber music sound with just enough reverb. Not a chamber in my house, but I could imagine this sound with a hard floor in grande chateau.
The D minor sonata by de la Guerre has been recorded before, and I’m familiar with several of these recordings. Bardonnèche manages to achieve a melancholy state in the opening movement, before a more lively Presto follows suit. She manages to keep the movement feeling relaxed despite the theme and running bass line. The Adagio is nicely done by Boulanger on gamba. In comparing this rendition against others, I appreciated Bardonnèche’s ability to color her sound. It’s subtle, for sure, but it stood out to me. I’d wager to guess it’s done by varying the pressure on the bow, but it’s was a nice touch when applied, more often than not to long-held notes.
A piece by Françoise-Charlotte de Senneterre Ménétou, a Gavotte was a short but lively piece. So well written, I hope there is more by this composer.
Intense heat comes across in the Rondeau from Les Génies by Mademoiselle Duval. Seems like the perfect music to depict fencing, a la three musketeers? The jump in the theme gave me that impression, at least. Some repeated figures seem to point to the Italian stylo concitato. The next piece, another Rondeau, Le triomphe de l’amour et l’hymen idylle by Mademoiselle de Fumeron is a far more docile piece; I appreciated Justin Taylor’s contribution in this piece. It’s a mixture of his timing and some of the lower sonorities of his instrument that I thought stood out.
Duvall’s music ends the disc, with a continuation of the same suite, with her Sarabande and Passacaille. The Sarabande is a delicious piece of music; I appreciated the ornamentation in the repeat. Although it would have been nice to hear something even more extravagant. The theme seems to call for it. The rising line, interestingly, seems to connect this piece with the aforementioned de la Guerre Presto movement.
The Passacaille gives Bardonnèche and her colleagues the opportunity to vary their dynamics to weave their sound in and out of the texture; she does it best, as the lead, but the piece employs a second violin, for which the effect is amplified when they are both playing. The piece weirdly ends, for me, after a sojourn into a minor tonality; the ending statement in the major feels strange. This is the music we were left with, but I am thinking of what kind of approach I might have taken when the main theme returns. Keep repeating it, erasing a different instrument at each turn? Putting in a pregnant pause before the return to the original tonality? Not sure, but I can’t help but feel something unsettling with how this one ends.
In the second sonata by de la Guerre, Taylor employs a chamber organ and the sound along with a biting gamba is nice. It’s obvious de la Guerre’s music is a level more difficult, but de Bardonnèche never gives us the impression she’s broken into a sweat. The piece is special, I think, for the full range of emotions that de la Guerre is able to infuse into the six movements. The Sarabande is another treat, but I was hoping for more variation in the repeats. The same would have been welcome in the Gavotte, which is otherwise played well.
I remember one of the promotion videos for Le Consort’s production of Specchio Veneziano where Bardonnèche plays second fiddle to Théotime Langlois de Swarte. I felt he seemed to overpower her playing. A friend made the same comment to me. I’m glad we get to finally hear Bardonnèche on her own in this recital. I think the program is a smart one, capitalizing upon the unknown music of female composers. As it turns out, the selection here wasn’t a mere curiosity. The pieces are first rate. As is de Bardonnèche’s playing. Her companions add to the value of this production.
