Solo: Bach-Abel (CD review)

Lucile Boulanger, viola da gamba. Alpha Classics 783 (2-disc set).

By Bill Heck

Regular readers of Classical Candor may be forgiven for not being familiar with Lucile Boulanger or, for that matter, with the viola da gamba. Indeed, I would venture to say that many readers of this blog have, at most, only a nodding acquaintance with the instrument and not even that with the artist. Although Lucile Boulanger has some half dozen recordings to her credit, and thus is hardly a rookie, I was unable to find any previous reviews in Classical Candor of discs by her – and not many elsewhere for that matter.

To bring us all up to speed, the viola da gamba is a stringed instrument that looks like a cello but may have from five to seven strings. (The cello has four.) Like the cello, the viola da gamba is played with a bow, but the neck of the instrument is fretted, like a guitar. There are various other differences, particularly in the tuning. The instrument was popular with composers particularly through the 16th and 17th centuries. The instrument used for these performances is a seven-string “bass viol” modeled on an instrument from 1699.

Readers and -- I hope -- reviewers also can be forgiven for not knowing the name of Carl Friedrich Abel who, in Bach's time, was well known as a virtuoso player of the viola da gamba, as well as a composer for that instrument, not to mention being J S Bach’s godson. Although the viola da gamba was falling out of favor even in the time of J S Bach, it could not have fallen too fast, as Abel toured as a performer with Johann Christian Bach, one of J S's many sons.

So this double disk set is filled with compositions for the solo viola da gamba by both Bach and Abel, right? Well, not exactly: while Bach did compose works that included parts for the viola da gamba, he wrote nothing for the solo instrument. Meanwhile, Abel's published works for the viola da gamba are generally regarded as uninteresting, simplified versions of the works that he played, apparently improvising, in public. Thus, the works on these albums are transcriptions of works by Bach and transcriptions of annotated improvisations by Abel.

This does not mean that the works don't work, so to speak. At least some of the Bach pieces were earlier transcribed for other instruments by Bach himself, so Boulanger's transcriptions (and indeed she is the transcriber for all the Bach works in the collection) follow in the master's footsteps. Meanwhile, of course, Abel's works really are his, even if not the ones that he published during his lifetime.

In this release, a few of the works composed by Bach will be familiar to most listeners, e.g., the Sarabande from the Sixth Cello Sonata, while others, although less famous, still are mainstream works, such as the Preludio for keyboard, BWV 846. The most important question, though, is whether the transcriptions work; that is, do they maintain the basic sense of the compositions while providing a fresh sound and even new insights into the music? My answer would be that they work well. I have written elsewhere that Bach's music survives transcription for alternate instruments better than that of perhaps any other composer, and there is no evidence here to counter that idea. In some cases, the sonic distance of the transcription is not all that far; for example, it is not a great stretch to get from a cello sonata to a version that works on the viola da gamba. Other transcriptions might be a little more distant, but none feel truly foreign. Meanwhile, the sound of the viola de gamba, while slightly unusual to modern ears, is pleasant, cello-like but with a different range, and expressive and dynamic within its limitations.

All these points would be moot if Boulanger's playing were not up to snuff, but that’s not a worry either. Her technical command of the instrument is obvious; her artistic interpretation strikes me as very appropriate and quite lovely. One could quibble here and there: for instance, the tempo in the latter half of the Sarabande of the aforementioned sixth cello suite (BWV 1012) is a little slow for my taste. But very few of even these minor issues intruded as I listened to these recordings. Of greater concern is a certain one dimensionality that naturally arises with so much music played on a single instrument, particularly an instrument with the restricted tonal range of the viola da gamba. (There were reasons why the viola da gamba fell out of favor a couple of centuries ago.) For example, from what I can tell there is considerable use of open strings on the viola da gamba, which means a restricted range of available keys and in the end a certain sameness of tone. Indeed, the first six Bach transcriptions here all are placed in the key of D major; across all 22 selections we see only four keys, and related ones at that: D major, D minor, G minor, and A minor.

This is an issue for the reviewer though, not for the average music consumer, because said reviewer is listening over multiple sessions to an awful lot of the double CD at one time. For the rational listener, this is a set to be sampled one or two or a few works at a time, not straight through all those tracks totaling 1 1/2 hours of music!

I should mention another positive for this set: the sound is excellent. The microphone placement renders the instrument cleanly and believably in real space, but still nicely captures the reverberation of the recording location, which is the Noirlac Abbey Cultural Exchange Center. You may notice that certain notes sound a little more loudly than others, but those sound like open strings, perhaps further enhanced by the resonances of the recording space.

Is this set for you? A concern for at least some readers is that this is not “necessary” music. For classical music fans, having at least one recording of, say, every Beethoven symphony is mandatory, and multiple recordings showcasing different approaches are easily justified. In contrast, no one absolutely needs a couple of discs full of transcribed music or works by a largely forgotten composer played on an "obsolete" instrument. Still, as I have written in multiple places, it is nice to have variety, and hearing music at once so different and at the same time familiar is not at all bad. Worth a listen for those at all curious about the viola da gamba.

I should add quick answers to a couple of questions that might arise for the attentive reader. First, I have been unable to find any connection between the artist here, Lucile Boulanger, and the famous piano teacher and composer of the early 20th century, Nadia Boulanger, although my failure to locate any connection does not mean that none exists. Secondly, yes, I noticed that the title of this release, “Bach-Abel,” can be read as a punning play on the name of another Baroque composer. Perhaps the wordplay was inadvertent. Or not.

BH

To listen to an excerpt from this album, click below: