Various venues, Kilkenny
The baroque strand of Kilkenny Arts Festival's first weekend began and ended with music by members of Germany's greatest musical dynasty, the Bach family. Saturday's lunchtime recital by William Butt at St John's Priory opened with the first of the solo cello suites by theBach, Johann Sebastian, and Sunday evening's concert by the young players of the European Union Baroque Orchestra ended with a symphony by Carl Philipp Emanuel Bach, son of JS, and one of the quirkiest composers of his time.
Butt is a soberly musical player, judicious in the tempos he sets, so that he gives the impression of always having time on his side. His handling of Bach had an air of centrality about it, of music and music-making that was in the zone.
He took greater risks, and put himself under greater stress in Kodály’s Solo Sonata of 1915, the first great solo cello piece of the 20th century, a work that both followed Bach and was original enough to set a new yardstick for later composers.
Kodály’s sonata is one of those pieces that always generates a sense of special occasion in concert.
The Baroque Orchestra presented a Bach family programme under the clearly inspirational direction of Lars-Ulrik Mortensen, a man whose gyrations of torso and rubbery flutterings of fingers and arms make him seem like some strange cross between a contortionist and a conjuror.
But the musical results were first-rate, the orchestra sounding well drilled in the Third BrandenburgConcerto by Johann Sebastian, the strange shifts of the Sinfonia in F by Wilhelm Friedemann (another son) negotiated in style. The closing Sinfonia in B flat by Carl Philipp Emanuel, with its flying leaps, rapid fluctuations of mood, and fondness for apparent non-sequiturs – think on the lines of Tristram Shandyin music – was delivered with real pzazz.
Elsewhere over the weekend the emphasis was on music from France. Mark Duley's choir Resurgam joined the Irish Baroque Orchestra under Christophe Rousset for a programme that featured two motets, Jubilate Deoand In exitu Israel, by Jean-Joseph Cassanéa de Mondonville (1711-72). The manner, even when dealing with jubilation, was one of refinement, of elegance being prioritised over immediacy of impact. Placed between the two works by Mondonville, Handel's Dixit Dominussounded almost raw in its directness, relentless in its pursuit of a stirring outcome for the listener.
Choir and orchestra were resourcefully responsive to Rousset’s musical direction, the five soloists (sopranos Deirdre Moynihan and Catherine Redding, counter tenor Duncan Brickenden, tenor Stuart Kinsella and bass Jonathan Gunthorpe) less evenly so, and they sometimes mixed assurance and strain in alarming ways.
Rousset also appeared as a harpsichord soloist, playing two suites each by Louis (Suites in D minor and C) and François Couperin ( Ordres17 and 8), uncle and nephew in another great baroque musical dynasty.
Louis is nowadays most celebrated for the preludes to his harpsichord suites, pieces which are written without a rhythmic scheme – the notes are all presented as effectively equal, with only some suggestive curls and curves between them to guide the player, who has to work out a scheme of proportions to make sense of it all. It’s a fascinating challenge, but the even greater imagination of François’s keyboard writing, its pulsing harmonic certainties, its sometimes adventurous chromaticism, its often glorious sonority, has long won greater favour with listeners.
Rousset’s performances were of the calibre to draw listeners in to the point of almost forgetting the discomfort of 70 minutes on a hard church pew.
Festival continues until Sunday
