Music of Jenkins, Coprario, Lawes, Frescobaldi, Kühnel, Buxtehude,
and Marais

Program notes

2 violas and organ

This panorama of 17th century music for two violas highlights very diverse musical styles, but finds a common ground in the instruments’ interplay: favorite instrument of enlightened amateurs and professional musicians alike, its tuning and wide range allow for a melodic play (horizontal) as well as “harmonic play” (vertical).

These two aspects merge gracefully in August Kühnel’s sonatas for two violas, where the two parts constantly respond to each other, alternatively playing the lead and accompaniment. The 17th century German musicians were undoubtedly influenced by the English viola school at its apogee. Numerous composers there indeed gave the instrument its letters of nobility, specifically in the polyphonic style of Consort Music; but they were also able to perfectly develop the virtuous potential of the viola.

In his time, John Jenkins was called “the Mirror and Wonder of his age”; his longevity and the great number of his compositions make him the very embodiment of this 17th century English school’s rich tradition. The apparent simplicity of his “Fantaisies à deux” hide a great ability in the treatment of the two parts.

John Cooper, alias Coperario, was Court composer for Charles I, about whom it is said: “He could play his part exactly well on the Bass-viol, especially of those Incomparable Fancies of Mr Coperario to the Organ”; it is about fantasies where the organ part is the main part, and the two viola parts are embedded in this ornate polyphony.

Christopher Simpson is famous for his Traité “the Division Viol,” which addresses all the aspects of the play and pushes the technical possibilities of the instrument to the extreme.

William Lawes, a student of Coperario, carries the “fantasy to the organ” to a high degree of sophistication and presents us with a very original synthesis; the violas whirl in “Divisions” around a theme played by the organ and borrowed from Alfonso Ferrabosco.

Another form of synthesis was brought about in France by Marin Marais; his Suite in G culminates in a long “chaconne” – a legacy of his master Lully, to whom he dedicated this First Book – where the art of the variation is put in the service of the “great form”. It can be said that Marais, right from the start of his career, reached a level of perfection worthy of the greatest composers.

Jérôme Hantaï
translated by Philippe Berthier

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