Tendres échos
Anne Thivierge; Mélisande Corriveau; Eric Milnes
ATMA ACD2 2871 (atmaclassique.com/en)
Flutist Anne Thivierge, viola de gambist Mélisande Corriveau and harpsichordist Eric Milnes, playing period instruments, bring works from François Couperin’s Concert Royal No 2 for Flute and Continuo in D Major and Minor and the Pièces de clavecin, the 14th suite (of 27) from his book Ordres to life – together with works by Marin Marais, Michel Blavet and Jean-Marie Leclair.
Couperin’s work is marked by expressiveness enhanced by rich ornamentation, which – unusual for the time – is never left to the discretion of the performer, but always precisely specified. Here he adopts what came to be called style brisé (broken style) in which the notes of the chord are not all played together, but one after the other (originally in imitation of lutists).
Marais, who studied with Jean-Baptiste Lully, had come under the latter’s development of a style that melded the French and the Italian (of Corelli). Marais’ Pièce for Viola de gamba and Continuo Suite No.1 in D Minor soars in its rhapsodic La follette movement and ends with the soulfully expressive Gigue La favorite.
On Blavet’s Sonata for Flute and Continuo in D Minor Op.2 No.2, the flute is clean and vibrant, the continuo gently sympathetic, as the musicians immerse themselves in the music’s warm beauty. An alert sense of rhetoric is evident in the intricately wrought, magical performance of Leclair’s Trio Sonata for Flute, Viola de gamba and Continuo in D Major.
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