United Kingdom Lammermuir Pageant 2024 – Muffat: Concerto Copenhagen / Lars Ulrik Mortensen (director/continuo). St Mary’s Church, Haddington, 13.9.2024. (SRT)
Georg Muffat – The 5 Sonatas
In 2023 the Lammermuir Pageant gave the impression to be staring into the abyss when its organisers found that that they had misplaced all of their Inventive Scotland funding, placing a severe query mark over the competition’s future. 2024 has introduced higher information, nonetheless, with some funding restored on a two-year foundation and, maybe extra importantly, resolute assist from the competition’s artists and audiences; all of which has enabled them to placed on as sturdy a programme in 2024 as they’ve ever completed.
At its coronary heart sits a four-concert residency from interval instrument superstars Concerto Copenhagen, performed by their boss Lars Ulrik Mortensen. I went to their third live performance, staged in Haddington’s huge medieval church of St Mary’s, the place they introduced essentially the most uncommon repertoire of their residency: 5 ‘sonatas’ for orchestra written by Georg Muffat. As you would possibly inform from his title, Georg, whereas born in Savoy, considered himself as firmly German, however his ancestors had been Moffats from Scotland. His sonatas are contained in his Armonico Tributo of 1682, and they’re actually concerti grossi ‘for a couple of or many devices.’
They’re additionally utterly charming, performed right here with essentially the most delectable sweetness and a scale that fitted St Mary’s like a glove. The primary comparability you attain for is Handel. There’s a sensuality to the music of Muffat’s suites that appeals on to the feelings, bypassing the extra cerebral mathematical attraction of Bach for the pleasures of the center and soul. The actions that comprise the 5 sonatas are generally summary and generally refined dances, and it’s fascinating letting the ear swap between the 2. The Allegros and Adagios have a good really feel to them, however the dances are unashamed heel-kickers, with some terrifically bouncy gavottes and menuets which have a terrific kick to them, and the entire set ended with a monster Passacaglia that felt like a refined round dance, filled with trills, grace notes and thrives.
Concerto Copenhagen have cherished this music for years, they usually play it as if it has a particular place of their hearts. Mortensen’s conducting positioned a stunning sheen of legato throughout the music, and that gave it a easy, suave texture that invited the listener to linger and wallow. Every of the sonatas had a distinct scoring, and the musicians appeared to revel within the totally different textures every required. The fourth, for instance, was successfully a Trio Sonata that threw the highlight onto the violins – was there a contact of birdsong to their playful allegro semiquavers? – whereas the primary and fifth had been full scale orchestral concerti, with spicy oboes and nutty bassoons mixing completely with wiry strings to create an total lithe, polished texture.
Whichever approach they had been scored, nonetheless, the general impression was one in all magnificence amalgamated with vitality and an exquisite liveliness. A night of music by an unknown composer is a danger, for each promoters and viewers, however this was completely persuasive and actually somewhat beautiful. And aren’t discoveries like this imagined to be what festivals are all about?
Simon Thompson
