Marais Works for Bass Viol

Authoritative, yes, but performances that seem a little short on character

Record and Artist Details

Composer or Director: Marin Marais, Sainte-Colombe

Genre:

Chamber

Label: Alpha

Media Format: CD or Download

Media Runtime: 60

Mastering:

Stereo
DDD

Catalogue Number: ALPHA036

Tracks:

Composition Artist Credit
Pièces de viole, Livre 5 Part 2, Movement: Prelude Marin Marais, Composer
Evangelina Mascardi, Baroque guitar
Friederike Heumann, Bass viol
Luca Guglielmi, Harpsichord
Marin Marais, Composer
Sophie Watillon, Bass viol
Xavier Diaz, Theorbo
Pièces de viole, Livre 3 Part 1, Movement: Fantaisie Marin Marais, Composer
Evangelina Mascardi, Baroque guitar
Friederike Heumann, Bass viol
Luca Guglielmi, Harpsichord
Marin Marais, Composer
Sophie Watillon, Bass viol
Xavier Diaz, Theorbo
Pièces de viole, Livre 3 Part 1, Movement: Grand ballet. (Suite in A): (D major): Marin Marais, Composer
Evangelina Mascardi, Baroque guitar
Friederike Heumann, Bass viol
Luca Guglielmi, Harpsichord
Marin Marais, Composer
Sophie Watillon, Bass viol
Xavier Diaz, Theorbo
Pièces de viole, Livre 4 Parts 2 and 3, Movement: Muzette Marin Marais, Composer
Evangelina Mascardi, Baroque guitar
Friederike Heumann, Bass viol
Luca Guglielmi, Harpsichord
Marin Marais, Composer
Sophie Watillon, Bass viol
Xavier Diaz, Theorbo
Pièces de viole, Livre 4 Parts 2 and 3, Movement: Caprice ou Sonate Marin Marais, Composer
Evangelina Mascardi, Baroque guitar
Friederike Heumann, Bass viol
Luca Guglielmi, Harpsichord
Marin Marais, Composer
Sophie Watillon, Bass viol
Xavier Diaz, Theorbo
Pièces de viole, Livre 2 Part 1, Movement: Couplets de folies: Les folies d'Espagne. (Suite i: Marin Marais, Composer
Evangelina Mascardi, Baroque guitar
Friederike Heumann, Bass viol
Luca Guglielmi, Harpsichord
Marin Marais, Composer
Sophie Watillon, Bass viol
Xavier Diaz, Theorbo
Pièces de viole, Livre 4 Parts 2 and 3, Movement: La reveuse Marin Marais, Composer
Marin Marais, Composer
Sophie Watillon, Bass viol
Xavier Diaz, Theorbo
Pièces de viole, Livre 5 Part 2, Movement: Chaconne Marin Marais, Composer
Evangelina Mascardi, Baroque guitar
Friederike Heumann, Bass viol
Luca Guglielmi, Harpsichord
Marin Marais, Composer
Sophie Watillon, Bass viol
Xavier Diaz, Theorbo
Pièces de viole, Livre 5 Part 2, Movement: Dialogue Marin Marais, Composer
Evangelina Mascardi, Baroque guitar
Friederike Heumann, Bass viol
Luca Guglielmi, Harpsichord
Marin Marais, Composer
Sophie Watillon, Bass viol
Xavier Diaz, Theorbo
Pièces de viole, Livre 3 Part 1, Movement: Plainte Marin Marais, Composer
Evangelina Mascardi, Baroque guitar
Friederike Heumann, Bass viol
Luca Guglielmi, Harpsichord
Marin Marais, Composer
Sophie Watillon, Bass viol
Xavier Diaz, Theorbo
Pièces de viole, Livre 2 Part 2, Movement: Tombeau pour M de Ste Colombe Marin Marais, Composer
Marin Marais, Composer
Sophie Watillon, Bass viol
Xavier Diaz, Theorbo
(67) Concerts à deux violes esgales, Movement: La raporte Sainte-Colombe, Composer
Sainte-Colombe, Composer
Friederike Heumann, Bass viol
Sophie Watillon, Bass viol
Fans of Marais’ music will want to compare Sophie Watillon’s new release with a string of other very strong, very colourful, recorded interpretations reviewed in these pages. Whether or not this performance or that best represents Marais’ way of playing is of course impossible to determine. Our taste is inevitably substantially informed by our times, in spite of all we can glean from original accounts of how he and his contemporaries played.

With this in mind, I have to confess that although I find Watillon’s performances solid and in most senses authoritative, they lack sufficient caractère. The Muzette, for example, is surprisingly understated. The gabbling Dialogue is taken too seriously and thereby deprived of its intended wit, a problem compounded in the Chaconne where the soberly drawn solo seems at odds with the rather jolly accompaniment.

Heard from another perspective, these are very private accounts – musique de chambre – scaled to small spaces and select audiences. The single work by Marais’s mentor, Sainte-Colombe, included here is, appropriately, delicately drawn (the only surprise is the reliance on the swelled enflé stroke usually associated with Marais’s later music). Even so, more should have been made of Marais’s masterfully graduated ornamentation and bowing effects in support of the rich harmonic progressions he devised, particularly in the Caprice, the Plainte and the Tombeau pour Mr de Sainte-Colombe.

In lieu of these notated resources, Watillon relies on slowing down the tempo to highlight passages, as in the hypnotic Prélude en harpèment, some of the Couplets de Folies, La Rêveuse and the Tombeau. I would also question the slow speed of her pincé (two-finger vibrato) in the Plainte and the Tombeau, which unhappily detracts from the sentiments Marais was seemingly trying to represent.

Her continuo players individually offer able support, although when they play together they threaten to overwhelm her. The Baroque guitar, a popular accompanying instrument for the Couplets de Folies, sounds almost too flamboyant in this pastel context. Caveat auditor.

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