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chelys volume 6 chelys australis

Chelys Australis Volume 6, 2007


Five minutes with Petr Wagner


If Petr Wagner's name is unknown to you, this is a situation you must fix as soon as possible! This young man is at the cutting edge of viol performance in the Czech Republic, and has recorded CDs of the music of Charles Dollé and Gottfried Finger, both of which have garnered praise around the globe. He is the director of Ensemble Tourbillon, which performs throughout Europe and, with Robert Rawson, his investigations into the music of Finger led to the recent performance of Finger's opera, The virgin prophetess, surely the first since its premiere. Petr took some time out of his busy schedule (which now includes a baby daughter) to answer my questions about his history as a viol player and his exploration of the 'lesser' names of the viol's history.

John Weretka: What drew you to the viol in the first place? Could you describe the training you undertook as a viol player? What were the opportunities like for a young person interested in the viol in the Czech Republic?

Petr Wagner: I heard viol first in the mid-80's on the famous Jordi Savall recording of the Suite d'un goût étranger by Marin Marais. This was a real cultural shock to me: I was completely caught by the viol's sound and of course by the taste and colours of French Baroque music. I used to play and listen to some Baroque music like Bach, Handel etc. before during my studies at the Prague Conservatoire (I'm a cellist originally), but after hearing the Marais record with Savall I said to myself: this is IT! No more steel strings, no more heavy vibrato, no more heavy athletics. But in the end, I kept on playing the modern cello until 1989. Of course, I wanted to try playing viol immediately, but because of lack of any teachers, an early music department at the Conservatoire and even student instruments to start with, I had to wait for a couple of years. After the fall of the communist regime in Czechoslovakia in 1989, the first official early music courses and festivals/concert series appeared in Prague and it was there in 1992/3 that I met Richard Boothby, who introduced me to the viol and its technique. I continued the studies with him in London eventually, too. Shortly after returning from London I heard Jaap ter Linden was teaching just 'next door' to Prague at the Akademie für alte Musik in Dresden. I couldn't resist and spent nearly two years studying with him there. Graduating with Wieland Kuijken at the Royal Conservatoire in The Hague (1998) was therefore a logical final step in my 'official' musical education.

JW: It seems most viol players were originally cellists. In a discussion I had recently, a friend (like me, not a cellist originally) remarked that we perhaps came without the preconceptions about sound and technique that we often saw in out cellist colleagues. What kinds of challenges are posed by coming from a cello background?

PW: Very interesting question, John. I haven't got a simple and straightforward answer though! In any case, I know there are a lot (I can't really say whether most) of viol players who started playing cello first (my case, obviously) and switched to playing viol or both. At the same time, I know a lot of excellent viol players who were originally professional double-bassists or lute players! As regards the sound ideal of my 'previous' instrument, the only traces of cellism I have observed in my viol playing is probably the richness, fullnes and power of sound I hope to produce. At the time when I switched from cello to viol (completely, in my case), my left-hand technique was already fully developed after almost seventeen years of cello training, which was a real help. The 'only' problem to solve was the bowing . and in fact, viol-way felt even more natural to me! Of course, it took a lot of patience to learn bowing in a completely reversed way but at the same time it felt more natural and relaxed compared to the cello bowing technique. So all in all, I would say former life as a cellist paved me a solid way for becoming a viol player.

JW: Your most recent CD was a programme of music by Finger. You've also recorded music by Dollé. What draws you to the music of these 'minor' composers, and how do they measure up against the 'greats' like Schenck, Marais and Forqueray?

PW: I distinguish two repertoire areas: one for live performances . this one is extremely rich and wide, and the other . fairly limited . is 'designed' for recordings (CDs etc). The latter is almost always dictated by hunger, sincere interest or just a search for novelty on the part of the recording company/label. That's the theoretical part of my answer!
Speaking of my CD with Piéces de viole by Charles Dollé, though, I just knew nobody had recorded the whole book before. So I just went for it and spent long months to learn these devilishly difficult pieces and prayed Dorian Recordings' final word would be .Yes, we'll take it even if it's by unknown composer.. They did take it and my long-time affection for Dollé's music was fullfilled: I hope I've proved most of his viol music is on the same level as that of Marais or Forqueray. I'm 100% convinced Dollé's music represents the very peak of late viol's technique: some of the pieces are extremely demanding and almost impossible to play, even compared to the wildest pieces by Forqueray. A real challenge for a viol player!
The Finger-for-viol-CD is a different case. I had never thought highly of this Moravian/Czech composer before I got in touch with an American musicologist, Robert Rawson, who introduced me to Gottfried Finger's work, namely his music for viol and theatre, mostly preserved and kept in British libraries and archives. A Czech Baroque composer writing viol music in Purcell's England.this sounded very, very interesting. Step by step, piece by piece, I fell in love with his generally neglected music and suddenly the CD with his wonderful viol music became a reality!
The term 'minor' composer is really misleading here: Finger was celebrated as one the most important viol virtuosi of his time, namely along with August Kühnel, Johan Schenck, Marin Marais, Jean de Sainte-Colombe le fils and others.

John Weretka

Louis de Caix d'Hervelois, Second livre de pièces de viole avec la basse continue Editions Fuzeau, 5968 (2006).


Following the Premier livre de pièces de viole by Caix d'Hervelois I reviewed in last year's journal, Fuzeau has now released the composer's second book of viol pieces, published originally in 1719, in facsimile. This publication features seven suites for solo viol with continuo accompaniment, broken into a group of four and a group of three by apièce pour jouer a deux violes in E major in gavotte style. The 'suites' are not so called and, like other contemporary French publications such as the pièces de clavecin of François Couperin, Caix d'Hervelois' publication is actually a collection of pieces in the same key that can be assembled as the player desires into suites for performance.

The solo suites, in D major, D minor (several movements are also in D major), G major, E minor, A minor, A major and G minor, are of varying lengths. The D major suite, for example, has thirty-one movements, including two musettes, two preludes, two allemandes and three minuets. All the standard suite movements are represented at least once in each of the suites although they do not occur in the standard order.

The dance movements are interspersed with character pieces, the titles of which are explained wherever possible in an accompanying booklet. Amongst the character works are a Marche du czar in the D major suite, apparently written to commemorate the visit in 1717 to Paris of Peter the Great and La Bavaroise in the D minor suite, commemorating a similar visit made by the Prince Elector of Bavaria, who came to Paris at the end of the reign of Louis XIV. Important musicians are also honoured: one piece (a gigue) is dedicated to François Couperin, another to Monsieur de Bellemont, a contemporary and colleague of Forqueray, and yet another to Mademoiselle Montigny, a singer.

The movements in the suites also vary greatly in terms of their individual lengths, ranging from the brief menuets of the G major suite to the four-page chacone that concludes the G major suite or the four-page caprice of the D minor suite, in which a lentement in 2 in followed by gigue-like vite in 6/8, one the few examples of multi-sectional movements in the book.

The music is of a consistently hard standard and, unlike some of Marais' livres, there is barely a technically straightforward work to be found here. This is not to say, though, that the musical standard is equal to Marais': on the contrary, the harmonic language and use of ornamentation that give so much of the character to Marais' pièces are not really to be found in Caix's. A considerable amount of chordal playing is expected, particularly in the préludes, alemandes and muzètes, while the pièces de caractere tend to be more straightforwardly melodious. Caix is meticulous about marking in fingering and bowing: the fingering in particular reveals that positions high up and off the frets are required often. The chord patterns tend to be relatively routine and fall easily under the hand, while the awkward contractions one often meets in Marais are not encountered frequently in Caix. Bowing tends to be straightforward as well, although there are the occasional passages calling for a more proficient bowing technique . fast slurs across pairs of strings or scale passages executed in one bow (including an almost two-octave G major scale in the cor de chasse from the G major suite). Ornamentation is restricted to the mordent, trill and port de voix; occasional use is also made of the flattement and plainte. There is also an unusual density of performance instructions, including contrasts of detaché and louré in the Rondeau le gracieux of the E major suite, contrasts of fort and doux in several suites, and indications of where to play notes égales in opposition to what must be a prevailing use of notes inégales.

As usual, Fuzeau's slight cleaning up of a contemporary source has created a score that it easy to read and preserves all of the composer's intentions exactly as he would have expected.

These works would suit an advanced or upper intermediate student and would create a wonderful contrast on a programme of French repertoire as a foil to heavy works by Marais. The music is certainly easier that Forqueray and Marais and does do not their musical and harmonic complexity, but this is nonetheless attractive music that rewards study and it would be great to hear the music of this composer, esteemed by Hubert le Blanc as a member of the empire de la viole, at least occasionally in concert.

John Weretka

50 standards Renaissance et Baroque, Pascale Boquet and Gérard Rebours (editors), Editions Fuzeau, 5046 (2006)


This excellent book takes tunes from the sixteenth, seventeenth and eighteenth centuries, as exemplars, with variations by composers of the periods, to show how to improvise. It's cleverly laid out, with a spiral binding, so that it sits easily open at the page of your choice. It's robust in the Fuzeau tradition, so will stand repeated use.

The text is in French, but the main message is in the music examples, so this need not be a major problem. This is not to say that the text is not important, there is a lot of information packed into the introductory chapters on improvisation, and excellent advice on how to start out. The editors are fully informed, and have made wise choices from sources familiar to those who have worked in this field: the Fitzwilliam Virginal Book, lute and viola bastarda variations from many publications, publications by Van Eyck, Ortiz, Playford, Ganassi, Christopher Simpson, and versions of la Folia, and chaconnes and passacaglias. The coverage makes it relevant for all instruments. They list more than eighty publications consulted. Even if you have access to all of them, this is a superbly compact summary to have to hand.

The fifty tunes (they take their cue for the use of the word 'standards' from jazz) come from various European countries. They include the 'stock' harmonic basses like la Romanesca and passamezzo, and international hits like Spagnoletta, la Folia, and Une jeune fillete.

I'm not familiar with the work of Gérard Rebours, a musicologist, but his collaborator Pascale Boquet will be familiar as the lutenist in the group Les Witches, who record for Alpha. One of my favourite discs is their recording of Playford's Dancing master tunes . her contribution is backed up by the brilliance and imagination of that marvellous group.

I looked it up on Fuzeau's website, and they sell it for .17 . superb value for 164 closely-packed pages. The skills it imparts so well are essential for all who play the music of these periods, and this is the best introduction to them I have yet seen.

Robert Oliver

Dieterich Buxtehude: VII. Suonate á doi, Violino & Viola da gamba, con Cembalo, Opera Prima. Sonata in F major Op. 1 No 1 BuxWV 252, Günter and Leonore von Zadow (editors), Edition Güntersberg, G091 (2006)


These trio sonatas were already famous in Buxtehude's lifetime, but are less widely known today. Full of affect, invention and bizarre extremes, they are a prime example of the stylus phantasticus, an improvisatory style 'free of all constraint' (Johann Gottfried Walther, 1732). Looking through a score of the sonatas, one is confronted with numerous contrasting tempo indications, often of very short duration, strict counterpoint that brushes shoulders with quasi-recitative sections and improvisatory flourishes that defy prediction. The result is some of the most moving baroque chamber music available to violists. To mark Buxtehude's three hundredth anniversary year, Edition Güntersberg has published all fourteen sonatas in Op.1 and Op.2 in a new edition geared towards convenient practical use, but which nevertheless stays as close as possible to the original. Each contains an informative introduction which places the sonatas within the context of Buxtehude's life and the chamber music of the day, a score and three part booklets plus a separate score for 'Continuo-Cembalo' with an idiomatic realisation of the continuo part for less experienced continuo players.

These sonatas were composed to be 'appropriate as church and table music' (Buxtehude, 1684) and this first F major sonata is a good representative of the sets. It is loosely structured in four main movements: a sweet Vivace concluding with a throbbing Lento over chromatic chords from the harpsichord (or organ), a busy Allegro ending with an Adagio dialogue between viol and violin, a flowing Andante with a rich Grave final section full of suspensions, and a joyful concluding Presto. Buxtehude's writing for the viol is challenging but idiomatic, and could not possibly be played on another instrument. Most of the time the viol remains an equal partner of the violin, but it never loses its own voice. Although there is no ornamentation notated in the original print (and therefore in this edition) it is almost inconceivable that this music was played without ornament, particularly in the Lento, Grave, Adagio and Largo sections. Perhaps some mention of this could have been useful in the introduction, although understandably any significant discussion of this subject must lie outside the scope such an introduction affords.

The edition is based on the print at the Uppsala University Library and remains very close to the original. All original accidentals are maintained (an excellent editorial policy) with clarifying editorial accidentals added in brackets where necessary, some awkward clefs in the viol and harpsichord are altered, original continuo figures have been maintained and missing bar lines added appropriately . all reasonable modernisations. Page turns have been well coordinated between the parts, and the layout is extremely clear throughout, particularly admirable in the full score. As an addition to the currently available publications of these sonatas (Volume 14 of the Collected Works, Broude, 1994, and an alternative facsimile from Fuzeau which is useful but rather difficult to read from), such a clear and performer-friendly modern edition of these outstanding chamber works is most welcome.

Laura Vaughan

Christoph Schaffrath: Duetto für zwei Violen da Gamba, Michael O'Loghlin (editor), Edition Güntersberg, G087 (2006)


Christoph Schaffrath was harpsichordist for Frederick the Great and musician to the king's sister, Princess Amalia. Composer of a number of orchestral works and keyboard sonatas, this duetto is one of his few surviving chamber works and is a fine . and rare . example of idiomatic gamba music from this early classical period. As stated in the highly informative introduction by Michael O'Loghlin (in English and German), it seems that this duetto was intended for performance by the king's nephew Frederick William with virtuoso gambist Ludwig Christian Hesse. Each part has a distinct character, the upper featuring the singing melodic style with the lower requiring more agility in leaps and energetic passage work.

The music is a delightful example of the Berlin style, well-written for the viol and refreshingly creative in its exploitation of the viol's special capabilities. It comprises three movements: a vigorous yet melodic Pocco allegro, an Adagio with a sweetly singing top line strongly contrasted against an insistent second part, and more furious final Allegro full of rapid passage work. Amongst the small but quality body of works for the viol that Hesse inspired, contributed to by composers including Carl Philipp Emanuel Bach, Franz Benda, and Janitsch, this duetto is one of the most complex and interesting of the duo viol repertoire. Presenting considerable technical challenges, this is not a work to be approached by the faint of heart, but offers rich rewards to those who have the courage to tackle it.