program notes
Les Violons du Roy
T
he names of Les Violons du Roy is inspired by the renowned string orchestra of the court of the kings of France. Organized in 1984 at the
Maurice Steger
A
ccording to The Independent, Maurice Steger is “the world’s leading recorder virtuoso”. And indeed, with his tours all across the globe and
instigation of its music director, Bernard Labadie, this ensemble contains
his numerous CDs, some of which received the most prestigious awards,
at least a dozen musicians who are dedicated to the repertoire for chamber
the artist has established himself as today’s most renowned virtuoso playing
orchestra by promoting a stylistic manner most appropriate to each time.
the recorder. With his dynamic style and his brilliant, yet spontaneous and
Although Les Violons du Roy play on modern instruments, their performance
personal technique, he has also contributed to a resurgence of interest in the
of Baroque and Classical music is strongly influenced by contemporary
recorder as an instrument.
movements of renewal in the interpretation of the music of the seventeenth century and first half of the eighteenth century, for which musicians use copies of antique bows. In recent seasons, under the leadership of Principal Guest Conductor Jean-Marie Zeitouni, Les Violons du Roy explore further the repertoire of nineteenth and twentieth centuries.
With a repertoire focused on Early Music, Maurice Steger is a sought-after soloist with the leading Early Music period instrument ensembles.
In
addition, he also appears regularly with modern orchestras, like Les Violons du Roy. But Maurice Steger is also no stranger to contemporary music: He premiered two solo concerts for recorder and orchestra and has performed Rodolphe Schacher’s musical fairytale “Tino Flautino” over 50 times.
For more information visit www.violonsduroy.com and www.mauricesteger.com Les Violons du Roy, Bernard Labadie, Artistic and Music Director, appears by arrangement with Opus 3 Artists
working in the British Isles also turned their hand to Corelli arrangements. Mr. Steger draws on ornamentation by various composers and virtuoso performers. According to his liner notes in “Mr. Corelli in London” (Harmonia Mundi 907523), he selects from decorated versions by the Italian violinist Pietro Castrucci, the English harpsichord virtuoso William Babell, He initially tackled six sonatas from Corelli’s Op.3, which are sonate da the Belgian recorder player John Loeillet, the French recorder player Jacques chiesa–that is, church sonatas, the older style with four or five movements. Paisible from Paris, and others. Steger writes: Subsequently, he arranged all twelve of Corelli’s Op.5 sonatas as concerti I studied the numerous exciting English manuscripts of these composing grossi. The first half-dozen of Corelli’s opus are five-movement sonatas with virtuosos and made a selection from them which illustrates the stylistic alternating slow and fast movements. In the second part of the opus, he features of performances in and on the fringes of the Handel clan during experimented more with preludes and dance movements, in the style of a these years. Music that in Corelli’s original was so clear, straightforward and suite. The Sonata No.10–Concerto No.10 d’après Corelli in Geminiani’s easy to understand has been so transformed in these arrangements that they have become one of the richest sources for English Baroque virtuosity. arrangement–falls into this category: a prelude is followed by an allemande, sarabande, gavotte, and gigue. Geminiani anticipated that the soloist in his Corelli arrangements would be a Spain. Corelli’s music became extremely popular in Britain, amounting to an almost cult-like admiration. Thus, when Geminiani made his decision to craft his own versions of them for what we would call chamber orchestra, he was appealing to current fashion.
The most distinctive movement is the Sarabanda, which does not have the characteristic long note values of the triple meter dance. Taken at a relaxed tempo, however, it allows for abundant embellishment, which is a characteristic of most sarabands. Also, the Gavotta is unusually brief: only eight bars. (Giuseppe Tartini later wrote 38 variations on its theme, published in 1758 as L’arte del arco.) There are subtle links among the five movements. For example, the Allemanda adopts a rhythm from the Prelude; the Giga uses a rhythmically-altered theme first heard in the Gavotta. Because of England’s “Corelli mania,” several of Geminiani’s contemporaries
violinist. Mr. Steger’s substitution of recorder for violino primo is impressive. A violinist can easily move from upbow to downbow and back again, or move among different strings, during rapid passage work. The recorder virtuoso must find an appropriate split second to breathe somewhere in the extended virtuoso episodes. Some of the violin parts transfer well to recorder, but the violinistic figuration is less idiomatic for the wind instrument–which makes its execution all the more dazzling in the recorder. In order to avoid transposition of this particular work, Mr. Steger chose, instead, to play four different recorders. – Laurie Shulman ©2011
36th season 2011-2012
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