Bertrand Chamayou, Heinrich Schütz, Pascal Yeast, Lionel Liminana and Marie Liminana, King Creosote, Bar Italia

2023-11-17 16:00:00

Letter(s) to Erik Satie

Works by Erik Satie, John Cage and James Tenney by Bertrand Chamayou (piano).

Cover of the album “Letter(s) to Erik Satie”, by Bertrand Chamayou. ERATO/WARNER CLASSICS

In the presentation text of this program where the false angelism of John Cage is meticulously confronted with the pseudo-pauperism of Erik Satie, Bertrand Chamayou is a little quick to make the composer out of Gymnopedics the ancestor of minimalism and, “de facto, what characterizes a very large part of today’s music”. A questionable presupposition that his game continues to deny. The pianist well recreates Satie’s own time, ticked off by a pendulum with a hypnotic, albeit irregular, movement. The roundness of the note, its bronze color and its immutable anchoring in phrases that spin like a merry-go-round at variable speed, everything that contributes to the mystery of the Gnossians or pages with insignificant titles (Real flaccid preludes, Sports and entertainment) is perfectly rendered by Bertrand Chamayou. The contributions of John Cage for piano, prepared (Prelude for Meditation) or not (In a Landscape), benefit from an equally careful interpretation. The latter, on the other hand, have a limited range, to the point of blinking like distant stars in the Satie constellation. Pierre Gervasoni

Erato/Warner Classics.

Resurrection history

Resurrection History SWV 50. Sinfonias SWV 471. Surrexit pastor bonus SWV 469. Sinfonia da Pacem, de Franz Tunder ; Christ is risen, de Michael Praetorius. Avec Johannes Gaubitz (Evangéliste), l’Ensemble polyharmonique, Alexander Schneider (voix et direction).

Pochette du disque Heinrich Schütz par l’Ensemble Polyharmonique paru chez Accentus Music ACCENTUS MUSIC

This History of the Resurrection (Resurrection history), by Heinrich Schütz, created in Dresden in 1623 for the Easter holidays, is an essential milestone in Germanic oratorio. The composer delivers a score with subtle and refined writing, using descriptive madrigalisms to better illustrate the divine miracle founding the faith. In the center, the role of the Evangelist, between recitative and chanting, whose liturgical melismas weave the framework of the story, here performed with sobriety by the German tenor Johannes Gaubitz. At his side, the Polyharmonic Ensemble, deploying both the beautiful homogeneity of its choir coupled with a rich instrumental color palette in the sumptuous acoustics of the Christuskirche of Berlin-Oberschöneweide. Conductor and singer, Alexander Schneider chose, to “prelude” to this Resurrection, the The good shepherd arose mixed with brief instrumental interludes (sinfonias taken from the O good Jesus, son of Mary SWV 471). The album ends in glory with the Christian is risenby Michael Praetorius, concluding with jubilation a program whose sensitive restraint and ardent mysticism have not aged in four hundred years. Marie-Aude Roux

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