Lully Ballet Music
View record and artist detailsRecord and Artist Details
Composer or Director: Jean-Baptiste Lully
Label: Naxos
Magazine Review Date: 10/1998
Media Format: CD or Download
Media Runtime: 73
Mastering:
DDD
Catalogue Number: 8 554003
Tracks:
| Composition | Artist Credit |
|---|---|
| (Le) Bourgeois gentilhomme, Movement: Chaconne des Scaramouches, Frivelins et Arlequins |
Jean-Baptiste Lully, Composer
Aradia Baroque Ensemble Jean-Baptiste Lully, Composer Kevin Mallon, Violin |
| Ballet d'Alcidiane et Polexandre |
Jean-Baptiste Lully, Composer
Aradia Baroque Ensemble Jean-Baptiste Lully, Composer Kevin Mallon, Violin Mary Enid Haines, Soprano Sharla Nafziger, Soprano |
| Ballet de Xersès |
Jean-Baptiste Lully, Composer
Aradia Baroque Ensemble Jean-Baptiste Lully, Composer Kevin Mallon, Violin |
| (L') Amour malade, Movement: Quatrième entrée |
Jean-Baptiste Lully, Composer
Aradia Baroque Ensemble Jean-Baptiste Lully, Composer Kevin Mallon, Violin Mary Enid Haines, Soprano Sharla Nafziger, Soprano |
| Ballet du Temps |
Jean-Baptiste Lully, Composer
Aradia Baroque Ensemble Jean-Baptiste Lully, Composer Kevin Mallon, Violin |
| Ballet des Plaisirs |
Jean-Baptiste Lully, Composer
Aradia Baroque Ensemble Jean-Baptiste Lully, Composer Kevin Mallon, Violin |
Author: Nicholas Anderson
The Aradia Baroque Ensemble are a Canadian group, founded in 1995. Their range of activities is wide, embracing baroque dance, on the one hand, and Stravinsky’s The Rake’s Progress, on period instruments, on the other. This new release features instrumental music and vocal airs from a selection of Lully’s ballets for Louis XIV and his courtiers. Six such works are represented here, the earliest of them, Les temps, dating from 1654, the latest and most celebrated, the comedie-ballet, Le bourgeois gentilhomme (1670). Each of these is allowed but one item apiece, the greater part of the programme featuring airs and dances from Lully’s contribution to Les plaisirs (1655), Alcidiane (1658), and Xerxes. This last-mentioned ballet was written for inclusion in Cavalli’s opera, Serse, which was performed in Paris in 1660 as part of Louis XIV’s wedding celebrations.
There is plenty of engaging music to be found in these precursors of Lullian tragedie en musique, and much that is on this disc is likely to be unfamiliar to readers. Particular favourites of mine are the “Deuxieme Air pour les postures de Scaramouche”, the “Troisieme Air pour les Esclaves et Singes dansans” – mischievous guys, those monkeys, to whom licence is granted in a departure from strict period-instrumental accompaniment – both from Xerxes, and the graceful “Chaconne des Maures” from Alcidiane. The vocal airs, too, are delightful and none more, perhaps, than the two-voice Recits Italiens, and the “Recit chante par Madamoiselle Hilaire” from Alcidiane. The two sopranos are very good indeed, Mary Enid Haines bringing an affecting air of expressive delicacy to her solo voice recit, accompanied by a theorbo.
The instrumental playing is lively, if on occasion, rough-edged and thin-sounding. What is especially pleasing in Kevin Mallon’s direction is the lightness of articulation which he draws from the strings. This is immediately apparent in the “Chaconne des scaramouches, frivolins et arlequins” from Le bourgeois gentilhomme, much the best-known piece in the programme and, in the present context, representative of Lully at his most impressive. Such playing is far removed from those heavy-footed performances of earlier times which, though conveying something of the graceful gestures we associate with the court of the Sun King, nevertheless ill-serve its balletic character and function. In spite of variable string sound, a thoroughly enjoyable release.'
There is plenty of engaging music to be found in these precursors of Lullian tragedie en musique, and much that is on this disc is likely to be unfamiliar to readers. Particular favourites of mine are the “Deuxieme Air pour les postures de Scaramouche”, the “Troisieme Air pour les Esclaves et Singes dansans” – mischievous guys, those monkeys, to whom licence is granted in a departure from strict period-instrumental accompaniment – both from Xerxes, and the graceful “Chaconne des Maures” from Alcidiane. The vocal airs, too, are delightful and none more, perhaps, than the two-voice Recits Italiens, and the “Recit chante par Madamoiselle Hilaire” from Alcidiane. The two sopranos are very good indeed, Mary Enid Haines bringing an affecting air of expressive delicacy to her solo voice recit, accompanied by a theorbo.
The instrumental playing is lively, if on occasion, rough-edged and thin-sounding. What is especially pleasing in Kevin Mallon’s direction is the lightness of articulation which he draws from the strings. This is immediately apparent in the “Chaconne des scaramouches, frivolins et arlequins” from Le bourgeois gentilhomme, much the best-known piece in the programme and, in the present context, representative of Lully at his most impressive. Such playing is far removed from those heavy-footed performances of earlier times which, though conveying something of the graceful gestures we associate with the court of the Sun King, nevertheless ill-serve its balletic character and function. In spite of variable string sound, a thoroughly enjoyable release.'
Lully Ballet Music
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