Jordi Savall and Hespèrion XXI gave the Maison symphonique de Montréal the second of their concerts in Quebec, after the Palais Montcalm in Quebec on Sunday. They will continue their journey in Ottawa on Tuesday. Experience has proven the existence of a real “Savall phenomenon”.
Once again the same question is raised by a Jordi Savall concert: where are all these people in “normal” times and why can’t we get them out for some other exceptional events? How many of us were at the Maison symphonique for a concert of viols? About a thousand, or even a little more… It’s huge for the genre: five viols on a stage, a theorbo and 90 minutes of music in four sections without a break and without the slightest noise in the room!
The introductory question is not insignificant: an audience that is able to “stuff” without flinching or coughing 90 minutes of music for consort of viols including pavanes that sometimes seem to have been born from the imagination of Giuseppe Valium or John Lexomil in person (Four-note Pavan by Ferrabosco, Pave V of William Lawes) is a rare and precious commodity. This public is capable of appreciating the most extreme refinement. How can we not motivate 440 of these people to fill to the brim a Bourgie hall which peaked the other day around 300 spectators when the Vox Luminis vocal ensemble came to illuminate motets taken from the Selva moral e spirituale from Monteverdi?
A surprise guest
Concert for ” happy couple », therefore, served to a large number, but very well articulated concert, in four sections. The first in excellent introduction, during which Philippe Pierlot played the bass viol; the second varied, with a beautiful work by Woodcock, the two parts ending with irresistible dances. It is in that of the second section, a Scottish by William Brade, that Pierlot has definitely swapped his bass for a viol treble. With Jordi Savall on the overcoat and Pierlot above, the group is more dynamic than when the group has an overcoat, a tenor, two basses and a violone.
To play the tenor viol, great surprise, Mélisande Corriveau, pillar of the Montreal music scene, had joined Hespèrion XXI. At the time of the recalls Jordi Savall thanked her, explaining that she was replacing the Hungarian musician who had not had her visa. This shambles of visas, of which The duty spoke to you a few months ago in an article “No visas for music”, and which had damaged the summer of the Orchester de la Francophonie, therefore still does not seem to be settled.
One of the highlights of the concert is therefore that, despite the impromptu addition of an external element, the musical quality has not been altered. Even if on the surface the members of the group do not seem to communicate very openly, the integration of Mélisande Corriveau in this high-quality ensemble with experts and some precious sound flavors (Juan Manuel Quintana on bass viol) went well. . Bach’s counterpoints certainly walked on eggshells, but the sound extinctions at the end of sentences, the nuances so precious in the Galliard Battaglia by Scheidt or the dances of Brade and Dowland, as well as the encores, were performed with cohesion and delight.
The 3rd section of the concert was a little long especially as it was the most pointed (with the pavanes), but fortunately, the last one, around the Passacaglia of Charpentier and Bach, with a Opening and Current admirable de Cabanilles, won legitimate support.
Jordi Savall now owes us a return to Quebec with a symphonic project, he who now conducts Beethoven, Schubert and Mendelssohn.