Search - Marcel Peres, Ensemble Organum :: Codex Faenza

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Giordano Bruno | Wherever I am, I am. | 08/26/2008

(2 out of 5 stars)

"Here's an example of how wrong-headed the great Marcel Peres can be at times, and of how desperately hard it is to perform medieval music well. I see that two previous reviwers have praised this CD highly; I can't imagine why. As a listening experience, it makes no sense to have all nine vocal works first and then ten instrumental works of the same style from the same source. But that's just the beginning of the problems. The countertenor, Gerard Lesne, is one of the prime Baroque soloists of our age, with a voice of incomparable natural richness. The other three singers are almost equally qualified, yet the ensemble is awful -- thick and muddy, over-freighted and under-articulated. The tempi are way too slow, the hockets hang over each other like horn players' bellies, and the whole butterfly sprightliness of this repertoire is melted into a texture reminiscent of a salted slug.

Then Peres sits down at his imaginary instrument, his clavicytherium, built I suspect after a painting by Fra Angelico or some contemporary. The thing has all the tonal charm of a schoolboy banging the rusty bars of the playground fence. Plus, Peres doesn't seem to play it very well.



Ensemble Organum has produced some of the finest recordings of early music ever made. Their CD of the Ockeghem Requiem, for instance, is immortal. But this one? "Ja ha," as my mormor used to say, "ever body make mistakes.""

A treasure for Early Music lovers, but...

Renato Bartoli | Italy | 03/28/2001

(4 out of 5 stars)

"This is a bugdet-price CD devoted to a 15th century codex found in Faenza (Italy): here we have the oldest collection of paraphrasis for a keyboard instrument, built around poliphonic secular pieces from Ars Nova's composers (notably Machaut and Jacopo da Bologna).
The original vocal works (not in the codex itself) are very well performed by Pérès and his own ensemble, with warmth and (remarkable aspect) satisfacting italian pronunciation.
Frankly speaking, the major interest would be in the keyboard transcriptions, performed by Pérès on a copy of a 15th century 'clavicytérium': sadly, I find his account sometimes a bit too cold and uniform, becoming gradually interesting only after repeated listenings; of course, careful comparation with the original work may help the listener.
Booklet notes and translation are good, so it's a true pity that I can't give full 5 stars to this nice CD."