I’ve never seen an ensemble take as much time to tune onstage as Le Concert d’Astrée did on Tuesday night, March 25, at Walt Disney Concert Hall. For a full 2½ minutes, the players went down the line one by one, section by section, checking each open string against the harpsichord. This assiduous care and attention to detail was reflected throughout the entire concert, led by conductor Emmanuelle Haïm as part of the Los Angeles Philharmonic’s Handel Project.
The premise of Tuesday’s program was simple and effective, centering on two pieces composed in the year 1739 — Jean-Philippe Rameau’s Suite from Dardanus and Handel’s Ode for St. Cecilia’s Day. For all the similarities between these contemporaneous court-employed Baroque composers, their influences and outputs were quite different. On one side of intermission was a French orchestral suite inspired by Greek mythology (and incorporating additional selections from different Rameau operas). On the other, an English sacred cantata honoring the patron saint of music. Le Concert d’Astrée executed both halves with finesse.
Haïm’s conducting style is both exacting and expressive; she leads solely with her hands, outlining subdivisions with tidy angular shapes and broadening her arms to galvanize emotion. Under her direction, the ensemble was a solid yet flexible organism. Unison ornaments and notes inégales were impressively coordinated, the continuo was always dialed in, and the ends of notes were just as sculpted as the starts.
In numerous bouts of fast, detailed passagework, the violins sounded — and looked — effortless. Performing with near-undetectable levels of tension in their bodies, they nimbly hit their notes in a visibly relaxed way that bordered on uncanny; the vast majority of them played without a shoulder rest.
Percussionist Sylvain Fabre was a highlight of the show, especially in the first half, tackling a wide range of instruments and often single-handedly alchemizing mood changes. It certainly helps that Rameau’s percussion parts are an absolute delight. From the high-octane, galloping punctuation of the bass drum (alternating head and rim hits) in “Bruit de guerre” to the delicate field-drum rolls in “Entrée pour les guerriers” to the wind and thunder effects in “Bruit de tonnerre” (this last from Hippolyte et Aricie), every percussion entrance was bold and vitally evocative.
The concert featured two vocal soloists — soprano Elsa Benoit and tenor Eric Ferring — who both sang with a range of colors that ultimately favored lightness and clarity. Their duo in the first half (“Que je vous aime” from Naïs) was especially gorgeous, particularly in the final drawn-out cadence, their prolonged friction on the leading tone making the eventual resolution of the note more satisfying.
The other two arias on the first half (from Castor et Pollux) weren’t as interesting, their orchestral parts paling in comparison to those in the rest of the Dardanus Suite.
In Ode for St. Cecilia’s Day, Handel integrates the instrumental and vocal solos seamlessly and amusingly. The florid cello obbligato that underpins the aria “What passion cannot music raise and quell!” operates as both expressive driver and accompaniment to the soprano. Principal cellist Mathurin Matharel performed this number with great sensitivity, weaving his sound through Benoit’s melodies and complementing her tenderly ornamented phrases.
In “The soft complaining flute,” the orchestra largely remained tacet while the ultrasoft flute and lute accompanied the soprano, creating a peaceful, muted blend. The bratty, retaliatory violins were ready to play again in “Sharp violins proclaim their jealous pangs.” The only part of the work that failed to move was “But oh! What art can teach,” a reverent, self-serious aria that dragged.
One of the biggest hits of the evening was “The trumpet’s loud clangour,” which featured Guy Ferber rousing the masses with a spirited trumpet obbligato. Ferring sang fun onomatopoeic lines — like “the double double double beat,” which has a literal doubling of notes within the beat. And the tenor’s well-articulated 16th-note runs were clean and bouncy, adding levity.
As fabulous as the vocal soloists were, it was the chorus (directed by Richard Wilberforce) that really impressed. The group’s first entrance in Handel’s Ode (on the line “From harmony, from heav’nly harmony”) was startlingly crisp, with rolled r’s impeccably coordinated. First-rate diction, combined with a powerful, characterful sound, made the chorus a formidable unit.
After a grand conclusion, Haïm took the mic and announced the first encore, by Rameau: “Danse des Sauvages” from Les Indes galantes (“I’m sure you know the piece,” she said with nerdy glee). After more curtain calls, she led a second encore, by Handel, of course — “Now Love That Everlasting Boy Invites” from Semele — maintaining programmatic balance to the end.
