Lammermuir Festival: Ensemble Molière: The Dancing Star
Crichton Collegiate Church - 10/09/23
Two years ago, on a similar sunny day, I attended a lovely concert of Trumpet and Organ music at this delightful venue in Midlothian. Today, an equally enchanting concert was given by the Ensemble Molière, a quintet of instrumentalists, specialising in baroque music in a heady combination of violin, viola da gamba, flute, bassoon and harpsichord. It’s an unlikely historical mix, but highly effective, and the ravishing textures available to these instruments made for an exceptional concert. Having met some years ago at the Dartington Summer School in Devon, the Ensemble Moliere, comprising Flavia Hirte (flute), Alice Earll (violin), Kate Conway (viola da gamba), Catriona McDermid (bassoon) and Satoko Doi-Luck (harpsichord), has established itself as top class baroque ensemble, playing on original instruments or copies of originals. Nominated as the Radio 3 New Generation Baroque Ensemble in 2021, they come to Lammermuir with a fine reputation, a reputation enhanced by this lovely morning concert in the beautiful surroundings of Crichton Collegiate Church.
The theme running through the recital was the story of Marie Sallé (1709-1756), the innovative French dancer and choreographer, who thrilled and shocked audiences in the theatres of Paris and London with her bold dancing, her new choreography, her flimsy costumes and her scandalous private life. The great composers of the day vied with each other to get her to dance in their new shows, and Handel and Rameau in particular loved her style, even if some of the audience was horrified at her daring and emotional choreography. She must have been great fun, but also a bit of a nightmare to control, especially in a world where men dominated, and women were expected to do what they were told and look pretty. As a performer who would wear men’s clothing on stage, and who was rumoured to have several female lovers, scandal was never far from her life, which explains why she kept flitting from Paris to London and vice versa.
The Ensemble Molière, models of restraint and delicacy no doubt, introduced several tranches of dance music which Sallé must have performed, notably suites arranged by the excellent Japanese harpsichordist, Satoko Doi-Luck, from operas by Handel (Alcina), Campra (Tancrède) and Rameau (Les Indes Galantes and Dardanus), as well as Handel’s ‘Terpsichore’ from ‘Il Pastor Fido’, and ending with ‘Les Caractères de la Danse’, a sort of examination in music, written by Jean-Féry Rebel as an audition piece for would-be ballerinas.
All these pieces were played to the hilt by the Ensemble Molière, introduced wittily by each member in turn. Sometimes slow, sometimes fast, sometimes solemn, sometimes joyous, these fine musicians entertained us royally. Playing on gut strings, the violinist, Alice Earll and the viola da gamba player, Kate Conway, demonstrated superb virtuosic technique as well as deeply expressive emotive playing, despite the constraints of a warm atmosphere in the church which involved frequent re-tuning. One of the problems of original music groups is that they have to take ages to get themselves in tune with each other. I can remember concerts twenty or thirty years ago, singing with such splendid baroque groups as the English Concert and Les Musicians du Louvre, which would add on an extra fifteen minutes or so to the performance, as we waited for the theorbo (the great long-necked lute) and the cellos and violins to tune correctly. It’s always worth it in the end, but we lost valuable drinking time after the shows because of it!
I was reminded of those heady days long ago by the splendidly theatrical playing of the Ensemble Molière. The idea that the music or the players of ‘early music’ represent dusty historical practice couldn’t be further from the truth. Watching the fun they were having playing to us in Crichton Church demonstrated once again how wonderful live music can be, especially played by such experts as these young women.
Having mentioned the tuning up, I must not give the impression that tuning was problematic. Indeed, when flute and violin were playing in unison, at enormous speed, it was sometimes difficult to work out which was which, so accurate was the playing, likewise the gamba and the bassoon. I was very taken when, on occasion, Flavia Hirte switched from her baroque flute to what I suppose must have been a baroque piccolo, taking the music to stratospheric heights. All the while, Satoko Doi-Luck, as well as making the arrangements for several of the suites, was a most accomplished player of the harpsichord, her fluent articulation acting as the ground for all the flights of fancy going on around.
One can only speculate on what Marie Sallé must have danced like, and I suppose we would have paid her more attention than the excellent musicians beside her, so, in her absence here, we could simply enjoy the splendid music for what it was. It was another triumph for the Lammermuir Festival, and here I’d like to commend the fantastic work done by all the ushers, car park attendants, programme sellers and helpers who make this little festival the joy that it is. Their obvious enthusiasm and attention to detail is first rate, and it seems that, whatever the venue, there are always smiling friendly folk to help us concert goers. We appreciate it enormously!
Cover photo: Matthew Johnson
