Couperin, Vivaldi, Rameau...
As the crow flies
Chamber music & debate
Presentation
“Art imitates nature,” say philosophers. But at a time when humanity has so severely degraded biodiversity, what will remain to nourish art? What if the first step towards better environmental preservation is observation? Through the lens of music, La Chapelle Harmonique and poet-reader Allain Bougrain Dubourg invite us to look up at a paradigm of life: birds. From Claude Le Jeune in the 16th century to Thomas Arne in the 18th—and beyond!—composers have continually drawn inspiration from “the winged ones.” Williams’s Imitation of Birds, Purcell’s Bird’s Prelude, the doves of Montéclair, the linnet and warbler of Couperin, the goldfinch of Vivaldi, the hens of Rameau and Fabrianese, cuckoos and nightingales: what a chorus!
Beyond mere observation, the bird that soars into the sky, whose song seems so natural, invites escape and reverie. What does the nightingale’s song tell us? Does it speak of love? Does it reference the night, as its English and German names suggest (nightingale, Nachtigall)? The poet claimed that dreams have wings… And for the author of Concert de différents oiseaux, these birds “put sorrows to sleep” and possess “voices more divine than human.”
So let us take flight with the birds, wandering from the Renaissance to the Age of Enlightenment across all of Europe, from Purcell’s England, Biber’s Austria, Van Eyck’s Netherlands, Vivaldi’s Italy, and, of course, France.
This concert-reading will alternate between texts by Allain Bougrain Dubourg, president of the League for the Protection of Birds, and musical works, both sung and purely instrumental, followed by a debate on the challenges of biodiversity in our time.
Allain Bougrain Dubourg, writer and narrator
La Chapelle Harmonique
Valentin Tournet, viola da gamba and conductor
Book
Press
05 juin 2024
Sud-Ouest
E. D
La Chapelle Harmonique jouera des œuvres inspirées par les oiseaux ce samedi au Galet
Un des temps forts du Printemps de la biodiversité de Bordeaux Métropole a lieu samedi à Pessac, avec le concert lecture « A vol d’oiseau » de l’ensemble La Chapelle Harmonique et avec Allain Bougrain Dubourg. Le concert proposera des pièces inspirées par les oiseaux, de la Renaissance à l’âge des Lumières en parcourant toute l’Europe d’est en ouest : l’Angleterre de Purcell, l’Autriche de Biber, les Pays-Bas de Van Eyck, l’Italie de Vivaldi et, bien sûr, la France.
