There are some albums that I can’t seem to stop playing because I enjoy them so much. Then there are the albums that I adore, so much so that I fear putting them on repeat: when the performances are so moving, so seemingly fragile in their beauty, that even listening feels like an act of transgression – to listen might stain their shine or dilute the magic. ‘Toutes les nuits’ belongs to this latter group. It is a stunning album, intelligently paced, and the performances teem in subtle musicality and softly spoken charisma. And though we’re barely into 2023, I’m confident that come Christmas, this will still be one of my favourite albums of the year.

The theme is hardly a new or unique idea. The ensemble Dulces Exuviae, made up of baritone Romain Bockler and lutenist Bor Zuljan, find inspiration in the night – its mystery, quietness, solitude and gentle eroticism. The pair find fresh meaning in the theme, and impeccable booklet notes by Camilla Cavicchi conjure a rich scene of court astrologers and evening madrigals, midnight kisses lit by moonshine. But this is not just music about the night-time; rather the pair seem to conjure the breath and touch of nocturnal delight itself. Particularly intriguing in this regard is Zuljan’s use of two lute instruments: a seven-course lute strung with gut, and a six-course lute made by César Arias in 2018 (after Hans Frei, c1530) specifically for metal strings – the booklet notes remind us that there are several sources from the late 15th to the early 17th century that mention the use of metal strings on the lute. The contrasting effects are wondrous: bog‑standard cadences or pockets of diminution work become thrillingly tactile – some resonant and bruised in indigo, others sketched in stardust.

The theme also plays out as a journey through the night. Dulces Exuviae have divided the album into five sections, each representing a different stage: ‘Twilight’, ‘Solitude’, ‘Dream’, ‘Moonlight’ and ‘Dawn’. A remarkable porosity between different movements scents the entire recording, and there are simply too many wondrous corners to mention (look no further than the way Bartolomeo Tromboncino’s ‘Tu dormi, io veglio’ emerges organically out of the settled air of the opening song, ‘O dolce nocte’, by Philippe Verdelot). The sequence that turns ‘Dream’ into ‘Moonlight’ is particularly mesmerising. First there’s ‘Toutes les nuictz’ by Clément Janequin. The words are utterly sad: the singer is happy only in his dreams for his lover has died. Daytime brings sorrow, and he wishes to ‘dream unendingly’. Bockler unravels in tender, heart-spun feeling. There isn’t a single moment when the pair aren’t living this music, and the declamation, so understated in its perfection, is devastatingly beautiful.

The sequence continues with ‘Toutes les nuyctz’ by Thomas Crecquillon. Bockler’s melisma on ‘soupirant’ feels like a kiss (the song’s whispered denouement is, even in this context, unexpectedly charming). Then the Fantaisie II by Jean-Paul Paladin, which is quietly spellbinding. One might expect loveliness soon to reach saturation point, but with such honest details and nuance it never becomes too much. When the Fantaisie II seems to be over, for example, and I predict the glistening major third as its final word, Zuljan teases us, as if to say not quite yet, mon amour, delaying closure just enough to enswirl this listener in their plucked breath.

The solo lute movements by Paladin potentially help to remind us that this is a duo of performers: such is the seamless, psychic ease of the pair that we do indeed need reminding. In ‘Estas noches a tan largas’, Bockler and Zuljan are intimately joined, yet somehow there’s capacious room for both to manoeuvre and sway: the ensemble has the give of soft, extremely expensive leather. These are the ebbs and flows that make the playing and singing throughout ‘Toutes les nuits’ come across as so irresistibly unrepeatable – that such music-making has been captured on record feels nothing short of a little miracle.

The production is exquisitely controlled, and nowhere is this more delicious than the amount of silence given before the album’s final offering. Night-time finally comes to a close with birdsong: Bockler and Zuljan bring us a Renaissance-ified version of ‘Blackbird’ by John Lennon and Paul McCartney. Here on lute, the Bachian basis of the song – McCartney credited the Bourrée from Bach’s Lute Suite in E minor, BWV996, as the inspiration for the guitar accompaniment – is wonderfully shaped. There’s something more air-spun here than the remastered version from 2009: it’s less by-the-campfire, more a love letter carried on the wind. <