Baroque is staging a comeback
The vocal and instrumental ensemble Les Arts Florissants, which is dedicated to the research and dissemination of Baroque music, will be coming to the Athens Concert Hall this summer to present one of its grandest productions – Jean-Philippe Rameau’s (1683-1764) «Les Paladins» – on an invitation by the Athens Festival. Founded in 1979 by the French-American harpsichordist and conductor William Christie, the ensemble was then leading a trend by performing 17th century French repertoire. The trend represented a slice of a much more general rediscovery of 17th and 18th century European music. As a forerunner, the ensemble met with unexpected success. Today, Christie, who has trained generations of musicians in various musical forms, receives invitations from around the world for his productions. In anticipation of Les Arts Florissants’ production of «Les Paladins» in Athens, Kathimerini turned its attention to the ensemble’s production of Handel’s oratorio «Hercules,» a production commissioned by the Aix-en-Provence Festival from Les Arts Florissants in collaboration with the Paris National Opera and Wiener Festwochen. This sensational production of one of Handel’s works is inspired by ancient mythology; its roots can be traced back to Sophocles’ «Trachiniae» as well as a chapter from Ovid’s «Metamorphoses» referring to Hercules. The show had its London premiere at the Barbican after a triumphant appearance in New York. This oratorio had originally premiered in London in 1745, with little success. What is impressive about its modern incarnation is the manner in which the ensemble presented it both as a spectacle and as a concert; the character of the production was neither revivalist nor modernist. Balancing somewhere between the two, Christie, an avid maestro (who was even seen mouthing the words during some parts), led his orchestra of early instruments to heights that revealed not just a lot of hard work, but a common vision. From this perspective, the work that Les Arts Florissants is doing could be described as culturally revolutionary. «Hercules» has never been recorded, but the performance conceived by Christie and directed with such inventive mastery by Swiss Luc Bondy, is out on DVD. The audience of «Hercules» comprises not only those who admire Christie’s version of the Baroque revival, but also those who keep a close watch of American mezzo-soprano Joyce DiDonato, who, in this particular performance, delivered a magnificent Dejanira (Hercules’s wife) that earned her a standing ovation. She is the star of the production, with highly developed dramatic qualities. The artistic feel of the production is strongly stylized (in contrast to the music) with a Doric bent that is maintained even in the most dramatic parts. This static quality – reminiscent of an ancient statue – of «Hercules» is the polar opposite of the opulent production we are set to see in Athens of «Les Paladins,» which combines modern choreography and technology. The presence of the chorus is emblematic, as it played a very important role in «Hercules.» According to the director, Luc Bondy, the modernity of these dramatic works «has never been surpassed since the ancient Greeks. This is because the Greeks invented a form and for that form they had myths at their disposal. Today we have the forms but we no longer have the myths,» he explained. This may be why the exploratory work Christie does with Les Arts Florissants, beyond its purely musical dimension, also possesses a more profound psychological quest that resonates with the audience’s need to hear a myth being told. What we are seeing, in a way, is an entire chapter of the history of Western music being reorchestrated all over again. Today, a compulsion to hear new things through a musical study of the past reflects a broader intellectual curiosity that defines the death of modernism. Great team produces challenging new ‘Hercules’ «Hercules,» though not very popular in its time – possibly because of the underlying religiousness of its Greek theme – is a challenging work to stage. The challenge does not lie solely with the artists, but with the audience as well, which must have some understanding of music history in order to grasp its complexities. At the Athens Concert Hall production of Rameau’s «Les Paladins,» the spectacle will be vying with the music for the audience’s attention. The production requires an indoor theater to be staged and, according to the musicians of Les Arts Florissants, it is a performance that has impressed all audiences, even non-specialized ones. William Christie, the father figure of the ensemble, brings together all the different elements of the production and cultivates a sense of belonging in the artists. «Hercules» has already been acclaimed as one of Christie and Bondy’s greatest successes as a team. Soon Athenians will also have the pleasure to see the fruit of another of their collaborations.
