WHEN Philippe Pierlot, director of the Ricercar Consort, effectively interrupted the flow of the music in the spellbinding little concert given by his group last night, he highlighted, probably inadvertently, a few shortcomings in the programme book accompanying the Consort's performance of a set of Elizabethan pieces for a consort of viols.
He wished, he said, to present his colleagues, and he introduced them one by one. I caught none of the names, but I'd like to have known. They should have been in the programme book. The festival managed to name every player in the London Symphony Orchestra last week: there were only five in the Ricercar Consort. There was, of course, a photo biography of director Pierlot, who was described as playing bass viol; well, whatever instrument he was playing last night it wasn't the bass: he was at the top end.
Further, I'd like to have known a bit about the instruments, a common practice today. There was nothing. For anyone who doesn't know, the viol is a fretted string instrument. A group of them is a consort, commonly regarded as a precursor of the modern small string ensemble, though the viol is a sitting-down instrument: nothing under the chin as yet.
Still, despite these niggles, at least Warwick Edwards' brilliant essay put the music firmly in its place in its historical context: pure instrumental music, with, to adapt his quote, "not a ditty in sight".
And what a stream of achingly voluptuous, poignant, heartbreaking music flowed from England's greatest composers, including Christopher Tye, William Byrd and, of course John Dowland, all played with finesse and expressivity by this magic band.
HHHH
Why are you making commenting on The Herald only available to subscribers?
It should have been a safe space for informed debate, somewhere for readers to discuss issues around the biggest stories of the day, but all too often the below the line comments on most websites have become bogged down by off-topic discussions and abuse.
heraldscotland.com is tackling this problem by allowing only subscribers to comment.
We are doing this to improve the experience for our loyal readers and we believe it will reduce the ability of trolls and troublemakers, who occasionally find their way onto our site, to abuse our journalists and readers. We also hope it will help the comments section fulfil its promise as a part of Scotland's conversation with itself.
We are lucky at The Herald. We are read by an informed, educated readership who can add their knowledge and insights to our stories.
That is invaluable.
We are making the subscriber-only change to support our valued readers, who tell us they don't want the site cluttered up with irrelevant comments, untruths and abuse.
In the past, the journalist’s job was to collect and distribute information to the audience. Technology means that readers can shape a discussion. We look forward to hearing from you on heraldscotland.com
Comments & Moderation
Readers’ comments: You are personally liable for the content of any comments you upload to this website, so please act responsibly. We do not pre-moderate or monitor readers’ comments appearing on our websites, but we do post-moderate in response to complaints we receive or otherwise when a potential problem comes to our attention. You can make a complaint by using the ‘report this post’ link . We may then apply our discretion under the user terms to amend or delete comments.
Post moderation is undertaken full-time 9am-6pm on weekdays, and on a part-time basis outwith those hours.
Read the rules hereComments are closed on this article