Unhistorical performance practices

One of the returning subjects of this weblog is the way the historical performance practice is compromised by artists in the early music scene. A recent example is a Naxos-recording of harpsichord works by the French composer Claude-Bénigne Balbastre (1727-1799), in which the American harpsichordist Elizabeth Farr plays a harpsichord with a 16' stop.

Balbastre's keyboard works have been recorded before, but this disc is welcome as Elizabeth Farr has made an ample choice from his output which is enough to fill two discs. If I am not mistaken Balbastre's music doesn't meet universal approval. He is often associated with the decline of the French harpsichord school which had its origins in the 17th century. It cannot be denied that sometimes he goes for superficial effects at the cost of depth. The reports of Balbastre's own playing as an organist don't help to improve his reputation. The English music writer Charles Burney heard him play in 1770, and reported: "He performed in all styles in accompanying the choir. When the Magnificat was sung, he played likewise between each verse several minuets, fugues, imitations, and every species of music, even to hunting pieces and jigs, without surprising or offending the congregation, as far as I was able to discover."

According to Charles Burney Balbastre had a Ruckers harpsichord which was "more delicate than powerful". Elizabeth Farr plays a copy of a Ruckers harpsichord, but here the tone is just the opposite. The main reason is that the builder, Keith Hill, has added a 16' stop. In the booklet he argues: "Certain composers of harpsichord music wrote pieces that beg to be played on harpsichords sporting a 16' stop. (...) Claude Balbastre also happens to be just such a composer". I have heard other recordings with music by Balbastre, and I have never had the idea that something was missing without a 16' stop.

Hill admits that this view is not supported by the facts as "no French harpsichords with 16' stops remain from his time". But "I wanted to hear what the acoustic effect would be if a Ruckers type of harpsichord were extended in size by adding a 16' stop, with its own soundboard in the manner of the Hass family of harpsichord makers". This combination of Flemish-French (Ruckers) and German (Hass) elements results in an instrument which is the product of fantasy, can't be considered a 'copy' and therefore has nothing to do with historical performance practice.

In fact, the use of the 16' stop is not just without any historical foundation, but - in contrast to Keith Hill's views - it doesn't do Balbastre's music any good. Sure, some pieces are definitely written for the gallery. But there is no reason to even reinforce the effects Balbastre had in mind. It is precisely the task of the historical performance practice to perform any composer's music with the means he had at his disposal. This is the only way to do his music justice and to communicate its features to a modern audience.

It is not the first time Elizabeth Farr uses the wrong instrument in a recording. Some years ago she recorded the complete harpsichord oeuvre of Jean-Henry d'Anglebert. Here she plays two instruments, a harpsichord and a lute-harpsichord. As I have argued in my review there is no real historical foundation for the use of this kind of instrument in French music.

In both cases I find Elizabeth Farr's choice of instrument ill-judged, not only from a historical perspective but also from a strictly musical angle. The use of these instruments - and in the case of the Ruckers-copy even the very building of the instrument - compromise the principles of the historical performance practice. Here the personal preferences of the harpsichord maker and the interpreter override historical evidence. But that is exactly what the pioneers of the historical performance practice wanted to get rid of, is it not?

Recordings and other events

In every issue the German magazine Toccata/Alte Musik Aktuell has a survey with news from the recording studios. This seems to me of interest to lovers of early music, so I am going to forward the most interesting things here on a regular basis. I also add some information about upcoming events, like festivals.

Let us start in the renaissance. The repertoire from Spain is quite popular, but it is mostly Tomás Luis de Victoria whom is given attention. And even from his oeuvre only a handful of pieces are regularly performed. The German label Archiv has started an interesting project, containing the release of a series of 10 discs with about 90 compositions by Victoria. They are performed by the Ensemble Plus Ultra, directed by Michael Noone. Also participating are His Majestys Sagbutts and Cornetts, the ensemble Schola Antiqua and the organist Andrés Cea Galan. Still, I can't help feeling a little sceptical about the interpretation. Some years ago I heard Plus Ultra in the early music festival in Utrecht, performing music by Cristóbal de Morales, and that was a bit disappointing. But we may at least expect to hear some hardly-known or even unknown pieces.
The Tallis Scholars also recorded Spanish music. The 30-year existence of their label Gimell was celebrated with a recording of Lamentations by Victoria and Padilla. I haven't heard it yet, but everyone knows what the performances of this ensemble are like: technically perfect, but hardly historically informed.

One of the main compositions of the early baroque is Monteverdi's Vespro della Beata Vergine. There was a time music like this was performed with boys' voices, but today that is the exception rather than the rule. So it is noticeable that the Knabenchor Hannover is going to perform this work later this month, with Concerto Palatino and Musica Alta Ripa. The solo parts are sung by adult soloists, though: the members of the German vocal ensemble Himlische Cantorey, with which the choir regularly cooperates. The performance will be recorded by the North-German radio (NDR). Hopefully this performance is going to be released on disc.

In recent years the operas of Francesco Cavalli are enjoying great popularity. A rare opera is Artemisia, which was rediscovered in the 1960's. Claudio Cavina, with his ensemble La Venexiana, is going to give a scenic performance this summer. I noted a performance in the festival KunstFestSpiele Herrenhausen in Hanover. I assume it will performed elsewhere as well.
More interesting opera news also comes from Germany: during the Musikfestpiele Potsdam-Sanssouci an opera by Carl Heinrich Graun is performed: Montezuma, which was composed in 1755. It is a scenic performance, directed by Geoffrey Layton; the Kammerakademie Potsdam will be conducted by Sergio Azzolini. In the cast are Florin Cezar Ouatu in the title role, Mireille Delunsch, Raquel Andueza, Makoto Sakurada, Mark Chambers, Gerald Thompson and the male soprano Paolo Lopez.
Also at this festival a scenic performance of Gluck's serenade Le Cinesi. It is a co-production of the ensemble L'Arte del Mondo and the China National Peking Opera Company. There will be intermezzi "in the style of the Peking Opera of the 18th century". I'm not sure what to make of this as a mixture of 'east' and 'west' in early music seldom works.

In the pipeline are two opera recordings under the direction of Diego Fasolis, with Max Emanuel Cencic and the orchestra I Barocchisti: Vivaldi's Farnace and an opera by the Neapolitan composer Leonardo Vinci, both to be released by Virgin Classics.

Recently I have written an enthusiastic review of a disc with Polish music by the ensemble alla polacca. It contained mostly pieces never recorded before. Considering the quality of that disc I am looking forward to its next release, which was recorded last December. It contains "music at the court of Hanover", with music by Handel and Steffani but also first recordings of pieces by Nicolaus Adam Strungk (1640-1700), Antonio Sartorio (1630-1680) and Vincenzo de Grandis II (1631-1708). That definitely looks very interesting.

The exploration of the vocal oeuvre of Georg Philipp Telemann goes on. Last March Hermann Max, with his ensembles Rheinische Kantorei and Das Kleine Konzert, gave the first modern performance of his St Luke Passion of 1748. It will be released shortly by CPO.

As I am a great lover of the music of Haydn it was nice to see last year that the recording industry has paid much attention to his oeuvre. But it seems one needs a Haydn year to see lesser-known compositions being released. I'm afraid that in the time to come we return to common practice, meaning that only the well-known repertoire will be recorded. We just have seen a new release of the London symphonies, conducted by Marc Minkowski - as if there aren't enough recordings of these symphonies available - and now the first volume of a new recording by Ton Koopman has been released. This is especially regrettable as their are still so many Haydn symphonies which are never performed and recorded.
It is simply a disgrace that still no complete recording of Haydn's symphonies on period instruments is available.

BBC Proms 2010 - a miserable showing

Last week the BBC published its programme for the Prom Season 2010. Of course I have looked what they had on offer in the realm of early music.

Let's see.
The ensemble Stile Antico brings motets on texts from the Song of Songs.
A concert by Le Poème Harmonique is entitled 'Venice - from the streets to the palaces'.
Musica ad Rhenum plays a programme of chamber music by members of the Bach family.
John Eliot Gardiner conducts the English Baroque Soloists in Bach's Brandenburg Concertos.
He also performs Monteverdi's Vespro della Beata Vergine.
From the Early Opera Company we get Pergolesi's Stabat mater.
And lastly, the Ensemble Matheus, directed by Jean-Christophe Spinosi, brings arias and instrumental pieces by Handel and Vivaldi.
And that's all, folks!

There are 76 Prom concerts, and just one contains early music, Monteverdi's Vespers. In addition there are matinees and chamber music concerts - the latter mostly in form of lunchtime concerts. The other six concerts are all part of these two categories. Let's assume that there are about 100 events in total. If just seven of them are devoted to early music, that is a pretty miserable showing.

On top of that, the programming is anything but imaginative. Bach's Brandenburg Concertos, Monteverdi's Vespers and Pergolesi's Stabat mater - as if we haven't heard them many times. Equally predictable is the choice of performers, with really no new names. Nothing against Gardiner, Musica ad Rhenum or Le Poème Harmonique, but aren't there any other interesting performers and ensembles around?

There was a time when the BBC was famous for its programmes with early music on Radio 3. It was the time when I could hardly receive the channel, as I had only access to the medium wave broadcasts. The reception was miserable, and in the summer months - when I had most time to listen - the medium wave was poisoned by that dreadful cricket.

But I was able to pick up an interesting programme now and then. And I regularly listened to the inimitable David Munrow who often had interesting stuff to tell. What has happened since? Now that I have the possibility to listen to Radio 3 in digital quality there is very little which arouses my interest. Now and then there is a belch of recordings with early music, but mostly with mainstream baroque and classical repertoire.

There is the Early Music show. But if it contains recordings of a live event, we only get extracts. If a concert is good enough to be broadcast, why cut it up to pieces?

Very long ago Radio 3 presented unknown pieces by the Italian composer Legrenzi or the German Thomas Selle. Much of what was presented at that time may be much better known today. Even so, there is still much to discover, but we won't hear it on Radio 3. Because of that I listen less frequently to Radio 3 than in those days of medium wave reception.

Not that it is really better elsewhere. In my Dutch weblog I have written about the recent changes in the broadcasting schedule of classical Radio 4 in the Netherlands. It seems early music has almost been banned from the channel. The German channel WDR 3 has always had a great reputation in early music, and regularly produced CD recordings of early music. But some years ago the early music department was disbanded, and it is only now and then that concerts with early music are broadcast. WDR even got rid of its own period instrument orchestra, the Cappella Coloniensis.

Maybe it is time lovers of early music make themselves heard. A little pressure on the various classical channels would not be amiss. After all, early music is an important part of the international music scene. It seems only some managers of classical channels haven't noticed. Time to wake them up.

East is East and West is West

Among performers of early music of Western Europe there seems to be a growing interest in the musical traditions from the regions around the Mediterranean. In particular interpreters of medieval and early renaissance music try to discover how the musical traditions of Christians, Muslims and Jews have influenced each other. Much attention is paid to the musical culture in Spain at the time the Cantigas de Santa Maria were created. It is probably the emergence of a 'multicultural' society in Western Europe which has led to this interest in the musical traditions of the East.

I would like to pay attention to three recent recordings which shed light on music of the East or confront music from the various traditions around the Mediterranean.

The first is a disc of the ensemble VocaMe (1), which is devoted to the work of Kassia, a female Byzantine-Greek composer who lived from 810 to around 867. She was born in a wealthy family and received an excellent education. She became the abbess of a monastery, wrote a number of poems and composed liturgical music, sometimes on her own texts. The similarities with Hildegard of Bingen are striking. More than 50 compositions are attributed to her, although the authenticity of about half of them is questionable. VocaMe has selected 18 pieces, all on a Greek text. They are syllabic and monophonic, but in this recording most of them are accompanied with a bourdon, either sung or played on an instrument. The result is a fascinating disc of music from a largely unknown tradition. It is Christian music, but with an unmistakeable eastern flavour.

Secondly I would like to mention a disc by the ensemble Doulce Mémoire (2), entitled 'Laudes'. The subject of the recording is the repertoire of the confraternities - often called laudesi -, associations with a spiritual and charitable purpose. In the meetings of these fraternities hymns were sung, especially in praise of the Virgin Mary. In his liner notes the ensemble's director Denis Raisin Dadre writes that during his research into the music of these confraternities "I became aware of the astonishing kinship of organisation and rituals between Muslim orders and Christian confraternities. My meeting with the Iranian singer Taghi Akhbari confirmed these intuitions." This led to a recording in which the laude as sung by the confraternities are confronted with comparable repertoire of Muslim religious orders. The laude are performed by the ensemble Doulce Mémoire, whereas Taghi Akhbari and Nader Aghakhani play and sing the music from the Muslim religious orders. Fortunately any attempt to mix the two traditions - either in the interpretations or in the musicians participating in the performances - has been avoided. That makes this disc an example of a confrontation of East and West which really makes sense.

Lastly, Alla Francesca (3) recorded a programme under the title 'Mediterranea'. "A panorama of the cultures to be found on the shores of the Mediterranean: troubadour songs, laude to the Virgin and estampies from the Trecento mingle with Sephardic lullabies and folksongs collected in Italy", according to the information on the backside. The ensemble makes use of the research into the traditional music and the performance techniques. It is a dangerous undertaking for classically-educated musicians to perform traditional music, but in my view the members of Alla Francesca are giving good performances here. They have not fallen into the trap of trying to sing deliberately unpolished or producing too exotic sounds. There are some influences of Eastern music but these are not exaggerated in a speculative way.

I cannot resist mentioning a disc which is an example of how not to confront East and West. The ensemble Celeste Sirene (4) has recorded a programme with music of the 17th century, including composers like Castaldi, Kapsberger and Marais, alongside traditional Persian music and improvisations in traditional Eastern style. Putting this kind of repertoire together on one disc doesn't make much sense anyway. What is worse: in the performance of some pieces from the West traditional Arabian instruments are used and Arabian-style ornamentation is applied. This kind of 'multicultural' performances lack any historical or stylistic plausibility.

(1) Kassia: Byzantine Hymns - VocaMe/Michael Popp (Christophorus CHR 77308)
(2) Laudes - Doulce Mémoire/Denis Raisin Dadre (ZigZag Territoires ZZT 090901)
(3) Mediterranea - Alla Francesca (ZigZag Territoires ZZT 090402)
(4) Gol o Bolbol: Early Music from Persia and Europe - Ensemble Celeste Sirene (Cavalli Records CCD 336)

Composing is no contest

It seems there are some people who don't like the music of Johann Sebastian Bach. But I don't think anyone denies his greatness. He is generally considered one of the greatest composers in history. There are more who are almost unanimously admired, like Monteverdi, Mozart and Schubert. But others may have had an important place in history, they are nevertheless controversial as the quality of their compositions is concerned. One of them is George Frideric Handel.

Not a few musicians of fame never perform his music. Gustav Leonhardt, for instance, has stated several times that he is overrated and that his music is rather superficial. Early in his career he has recorded some of Handel's harpsichord suites, and he participated in a recording of Handel's wind sonatas by Frans Brüggen and Bruce Haynes. But otherwise he has stayed away from Handel.

Likewise Philippe Herreweghe, although having recorded many of the most important sacred works of the 17th and 18th centuries, has never conducted sacred music by Handel. I am not aware of any statements in regard to Handel from Herreweghe, but I can imagine him having the same views as Leonhardt.

Recently a Dutch newspaper published an interview with the renowned bass Peter Kooy, who often works with Philippe Herreweghe and Masaaki Suzuki. He is happy to be considered a baroque specialist, but still wants to avoid some baroque composers. He mentions particularly Handel, who may have written well for the voice, but whose music is often harmonically not interesting enough and is missing depth.
Everyone is entitled to his opinion, and if a singer doesn't like a composer he does well to stay away from his music. Performing music you don't believe in doesn't make sense and does the composer, the audience and the interpreter an ill service.

At the same time it is questionable whether it makes any sense to compare composers. One can debate ad nauseam whether Bach is a better composer than Handel or than Telemann, but in my view that is pretty useless. Composers certainly preferred a style of composing, but their oeuvre also reflects the circumstances in which they lived and worked. It may be fascinating to speculate what kind of music Telemann had written if he had been appointed Thomaskantor in Leipzig instead of Bach. But we will never know. And had Bach become a representative of the German Enlightenment if he had been Musikdirektor in Hamburg? It is anybody's guess.

Telemann was once considered a composer of rather lightweight music, mainly written for amateurs. That judgement was based on that part of his chamber music which was printed in the early days of the re-emerging interest in baroque music. In recent times other parts of his oeuvre have been explored and it has been recognized that there is more to him than was prevously thought.
We now know that he was able to write in the 'learned' style mostly associated with Bach, and that he had thorough knowledge of the German tradition of counterpoint and did indeed compose in that style. But he mostly did not, because he composed for audiences which didn't ask for such music. And as he embraced the ideals of the Enlightenment in regard to educating people with music he aimed at giving his clientele what it was asking for.

Likewise, Handel was writing music according to the needs and wishes of the circles he was part of. There is no reason to believe his skills as a composer were inferior to those of Johann Sebastian Bach. After all, every would-be composer - or any musician, for that matter - received a thorough musical education. But why would he write music nobody was interested in? It may be true that most of his music is harmonically less interesting than Bach's, that doesn't mean it is less expressive. There are mores ways to express affetti than harmony alone.

Peter Kooy doesn't like opera very much. That is fair enough; he is not the only one. And it is true that a singer who doesn't like opera has little business in Handel's music. Most of his oratorios may have biblical subjects, stylistically they are not that much different from his operas. And the chamber cantatas are a kind of pocket-size operas.
But that is no reason to dismiss Handel as a composer. In his operatic music, whether secular or sacred, he reaches great heights of expression. In particular many of his duets are hard to surpass in that respect.
And even outside the operatic works there are some treasures in Handel's oeuvre. As much as I personally prefer Bach over Handel, I definitely wouldn't like to miss Messiah or Israel in Egypt - two monuments of sacred vocal music -, or his organ concertos.

In my view any composer should be judged on his own merits. Composing is no contest. Comparing composers of different backgrounds and judging them out of their context is basically unhistorical. It doesn't do them any justice, not even the one who comes out on top.

Education projects

There is much talk about the ageing of the audiences of classical concerts. I can speak out of experience: at the concerts I am attending I see many grey and bald heads, and very few people who are not at least in middle age. As I only attend concerts with early music it is possible that the situation is better in other sections of the classical music scene. But from what I hear and read that is not really the case.

The cause of this situation may be partly financial: people under 40 probably have not enough spending power to attend concerts at a regular basis. But it is also a matter of not being acquainted with classical music. This is partly the result of the bad state of music education in schools in the Netherlands. And I wonder whether that is really different elsewhere.

Lamenting this state of affairs is one thing, trying to do something about it is quite different. Fortunately there are musicians who create and take opportunities to present themselves and the music they love to young people. Some years ago the Belgian violinist and conductor Sigiswald Kuijken performed all London symphonies by Haydn, and as part of that project he also talked about Haydn and his symphonies to young people. I heard some fragments of it on Belgian radio, and Kuijken was quite good in explaining what the music was all about.

The Holland Baroque Society also has developed some educational projects of its own. Its website says: "Children and young people in the Netherlands no longer come into contact with classical music in general, including Baroque music, as a matter of course. So Holland Baroque Society sees it as a duty to take it themselves to the schools, and in that way introduce students to the beauty of the Baroque. As with their concert series, HBS organises their educational work on a project-basis, which run parallel to the concerts. In this way they hope to impart their own enthusiasm for this music, and use their own inspiration to stimulate the children’s creativity."

They organise so-called 'Kids Only concerts'. They are presented "exclusively for those students that have taken part in the educational project, and the form and length of the concert is tailored to the age of the audience. The concert’s program revisits the material previously handled by the musicians during the lessons."

They give an example of a visit to a school where members of the orchestra gave presentations to every class with classical music in general, and music of the baroque in particular. This is an excellent example of an attempt to introduce young people to classical music.

Another ensemble has developed activities in this field. Recently a disc with German sacred music by the Swiss ensemble Gli Angeli Genève, directed by Stephan MacLeod, was released (Sony). The booklet tells us that "[as] part of its educational activities, Gli Angeli Geneve enabled secondary school students to spend an entire semester, under a pilot project, helping to organise and make all the arrangements for one of its concerts." This included scheduling, preparing contracts and organising concert tickets. "In a more musicological vein, they were introduced to musical analysis and the history of the cantata, they wrote a large portion of the notes that follow, originally for the programme to the Gli Angeli concert which took place in January 2009".

This way the ensemble extended its activities with primary-school children to older pupils. "[They] met the members of Gli Angeli Genève, in class or at rehearsal, and learned what professional life for them actually implies."

These are some examples of activities I know of which show professional musicians taking responsibility for promoting classical, and in particular early music. It would be great if others would copy their examples. Hopefully this kind of activities will result in more young people attending classical concerts in the future.

A creative approach

Creativity is an important quality of any musician, and in particular of interpreters of early music. Not everything the composer had in mind is to be found in the score. Not everything can be written down, and not everything needed to be written down in the composer's time. Apart from the fact that often interpreters and composers were identical there were practices and aesthetic ideals which were generally shared. It is the challenge to modern interpreters to find them and incorporate them in their performances.

If a reviewer writes that a performance is characterised by a 'creative approach' to the repertoire that is generally meant as a compliment. For me it means that an interpreter is emphasizing elements which are in the score but are often overlooked or not fully explored. An example are the many recordings of baroque instrumental music by Nikolaus Harnoncourt with his Concentus musicus Wien. Also interesting in this respect are the interpretations of Jed Wentz and his ensemble Musica ad Rhenum, in particular in regard to tempo and rubato.

Another example of a 'creative approach' is the performance of music in another scoring than one is used to. For instance, recently the French harpsichordist Noelle Spieth has recorded the Pièces de clavecin en concert by Jean-Philippe Rameau on harpsichord, without additional instruments. This option is specifically mentioned by Rameau, but as far as I know they have never been recorded this way. And in the liner notes of her recording other examples of French music are given which according to the composer can be performed in an alternative scoring. So musicians who put that into practice should gain applause.

But not every creative approach is applaudable. Recently I listened to a new recording of some of Vivaldi's sonatas for cello and bc. There is no lack of recordings of this repertoire, but when they are played by the Belgian cellist Roel Dieltiens that is something to look forward to. He belongs to the world's elite of the baroque cello as a number of fine recordings testify. He also has his own ensemble, Explorations, with which he explores often unknown territory. But the Vivaldi recording was a severe disappointment. In my review I have labelled it a 'stinker'. I hardly ever use that word as I have much respect for musicians and am convinced they give of their best in their performances. But what Dieltiens and his colleagues are delivering is inacceptable.

Not everyone thinks that way. In the April issue of Gramophone the disc is one of the 'Editor's Choices', and in his review Duncan Druce praises the recording as "a creative approach (...) that will make you listen afresh". He notices the "large, continually varied continuo group". There is nothing new about that: it is the fashion of the day, as I have written in my previous entry in this weblog. Whereas Duncan Druce obviously judges this practice positively I find it extremely annoying and completely uncalled for. What Duncan Druce calls "accompaniments that are often profusely elaborated" I'd rather tag as "exaggerated". In his view the "improvised interpolations" are part of a creative approach which is "throwing new light on the music". Which new light, I wonder. Are these performances bringing us closer to the music as Vivaldi might have wanted it to be played? Is there any historical foundation for this kind of improvisations, including an "organ toccata" which is as long as two movements? And what about the inclusion of a song between two movements? Did Vivaldi really expected his performers to burst out in a song?

Anyone is entitled to his opinion. And I know very well that Duncan Druce is a professional musician and reviewer and knows the early music scene from within. But even so, what worries me is that the 'creative approach' is applauded as if this is a quality in itself, independent of the music's historical context. It is revealing that in the whole review there is no consideration of what the historical sources might have to say. It seems unlikely that they indicate that there should be no singing between two movements of a cello sonata by Vivaldi. But I would be very surprised if there would be any historical evidence giving at least some plausibility to Roel Dieltiens' approach.

Yes, creativity is an important quality for any performer of early music. But might we expect at least a 'historically informed creativity', please?