L'Achéron

The viola da gamba has always had a deeply intimate connection with the human voice, seeking to mirror its contours and inflections and accompany it in a multitude of forms. This relationship reached its golden age during the English Renaissance. England was fascinated by the brilliance of the Italian vocal repertoire, then the most fertile artistic centre in Europe. The passion for madrigals crossed the Channel: these vocal pieces were sometimes translated into English, sometimes simply played on instruments, before being imitated by British composers themselves. Thus was born the English madrigal school.

But the real revolution came when certain masters decided to cross a new frontier: borrowing the complex form and architecture of the madrigal, they freed themselves from lyrics to create purely instrumental music, an abstract form of great expressiveness. Thus was born the Fantasia for consort of viols: a work whose essence is vocal, but whose language is entirely that of the strings. These Fantasies would soon form the heart of English consort music. 

The boundary between singing and instrumental music remains thin, however: many collections of madrigals from the period describe themselves as apt for voices and viols, giving musicians the freedom to sing or play them. This programme invites us to explore this subtle interplay of imitation and mirroring, this constant dialogue between the eloquence of Italian and British madrigals and the expressive purity of instrumental fantasias, or how viols learned to sing without words.

Works by Monteverdi, Gesualdo, Byrd, Weelkes, Gibbons, Purcell, etc.

Cast: 5 violas da gamba