Johann Sebastian Bach (1685-1750)
Violin Concerto No. 1 in A minor, BWV 1041
Violin Concerto No. 2 in E, BWV 1042
Tomaso Albinoni (1671-1751)
String Sonata à 5 in G, Op. 2 No. 1
String Sonata à 5 in G Minor, Op. 2 No. 11
Georg Philipp Telemann (1681-1767)
Viola Concerto in G, TWV 51
Sophie Gent (violin), Kathleen Kajioka (viola)
Ensemble Masques/Olivier Fortin
rec. 2023, Fresse, France
Reviewed as a download
Alpha Classics 1140[61]
Ensemble Masques under the leadership of harpsichordist Olivier Fortin have made some fine records for Alpha Classics. My favourite would have to be their Routes du café title that explored the coffee routes that brought the drink from Constantinople to the capitals of Europe in the seventeenth century. It obviously ended with Bach’s Coffee cantata (review). They have given us a couple of discs devoted to Bach (review – review), and several other interesting records, too, since signing for the label ten years ago. They are a small group based around six key players: two violins, viola, cello doubling bass viol, double bass/violone and keyboard. I find their musicality very impressive: they play as chamber instrumentalists, yet relish solos with a non-showy virtuosity that is entirely appropriate. In their new release, we hear the two solo violin concerti of Bach, Telemann’s great viola concerto and a couple of Albinoni creations from his Opus 2 set.
I have alluded to the style and class of Ensemble Masques. I hadn’t realised they had a residency at the Abbaye de Cluny in France. This place has always had an allure for me. I have never yet made the pilgrimage but ever since I watched Kenneth Clark’s Civilisation where he uses the constitution of Cluny as the defining moment that saw the definitive dawning of western civilisation in around 1100, the place has always had a mystery and attraction for me. Ensemble Masques get to base themselves in that place of great learning, tradition and history. How inspiring that must be. I see that this summer they are performing Rameau’s Pygmalion there and touring it to other inspiring locations in France and beyond.
In the Bach concertos we hear as solo violinist Sophie Gent. The stellar groups she has performed with make impressive reading. She plays a Jacob Stainer from 1676 with a small yet beautifully crafted tone. The concerto in A minor is, I believe, later than the companion work. I cannot back this up, but just feel that. We know that Bach played it in Leipzig at the Collegium Musicum in 1730. As with the E major work he was heavily influenced by Vivaldi whose music he would have first encountered in Weimar after 1710. The way solo and tutti passages interplay, the ritornello form of those first movements; all speak of the Italian manner, actually the Venetian school. In the E major concerto, which almost certainly dates from his Köthen period (early 1720s) I enjoyed Gent’s playful skipping above the ever-changing chords as Bach develops the ambitious technical structure of this great first movement. In this work he was writing for a patron who wanted to be impressed by quality instrumental works. The extended span of this first movement reflects that, I think, especially those passages where Bach explores the minor key and that curious solo and extended pause before the return of the main subject material. There are many examples you will hear where Gent’s colleagues embellish and even take the lead. Gent is sensitive to this and the collective trust they have in each other is clearly audible. The sound is engineered naturally and sensitively; the violin solo is not especially spotlighted.
The A minor concerto has an andante as its second movement, an expressive cantilena that sings over an ostinato bass line. When I saw the timing of the movement at 5:15 I was glad. There’s nothing worse than groups that turn this andante into an adagio; it needs to move and when it does the intricate decorations the solo line paints, are even more effective. In the E major work conversely, Bach does indeed write an adagio. This is a noble lament and one of Bach’s most sublime moments of the period. The music is chaconne-like. You may crave for a lusher violin tone in places, it is true, but the poignant playing of Sophie Gent supported by her likeminded colleagues is very well judged and will I think pass the test of time. She is lovely in both finales. In the A minor work, a fugal gigue and in the E major, a rondo if ever there was one, I think the refrain returns five times! Gent is sparkling and fizzy.
The Italians had no great love of the viola. Vivaldi wrote literally hundreds of violin concerti, 27 for cello but not a single specimen for that instrument. In Germany, however, there was more interest. In Hamburg, Reinhard Keiser wrote for it, Bach himself writes some solos for the instrument in several cantatas and in his sixth Brandenburg Concerto. It was Telemann though who penned the first viola concerto around 1720. Like Bach, he employed an Italian technique to its construction. This time it is modelled on the sonata da chiesa style; perhaps Corelli was an influence. Ensemble Masques field Toronto-based Kathleen Kajioka as soloist.
Telemann’s concerto is in four movements, and it begins with a largo. The writing is simple and honest. Telemann concentrates on the lower registers of the viola playing to its mellow qualities. Kajioka is very mellow and plays straight without vibrato or heavy ornamentation. The allegro that follows has those same ritornello effects as the first movement had but offers opportunities for some virtuosity. The andante is an expressive song in the minor key, lightly accompanied. I have heard soloists go more deeply into the core of this piece than Kajioka manages; it is attractive and nicely paced, nonetheless. The slow-fast-slow-fast model completes with a high energy presto. Again, the playing is fluent and accomplished but I would have liked a little more injection of pace if I am honest. My favourite recent account of the Telemann concerto is Antoine Tamestit’s record for Harmonia Mundi (review). I listened to it again after this new version; it really is a superb account of the work to which this new reading, for all its undoubted qualities, will have to defer.
Ensemble Masques intersperse a couple of “sinfonie a cinque” works in between the concerti. It is a clever plan. As I have earlier stated both Telemann and Bach used Italian masters as influences and models in their music. Albinoni published his Opus 2 set of music in Venice in 1700. The ambiguous titles like sonatas, sinfonias, concerti matter little really. These charming miniatures are written in five parts: two violins, two violas and bass continuo. Ensemble Masques use cello, double bass and harpsichord on the bass line, but the remainder is one instrument per part. The group really shines in these little jewels, and I really enjoyed them. Most people only know Albinoni for his oboe concertos but he wrote so much; unfortunately, much of it lost to us now.
This is another fine achievement, then, for this group. I do hope they will keep exploring neglected repertory in subsequent projects. Their recent Legrenzi disc was most interesting, not to mention a much older one they did based on music by Romanus Weichlein (review).
Philip Harrison
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