Couperin : Pièces De Violes. Koopman, Savall.

   in Early Music Today (Jun, 2013)
This reissue of a 1975 recording on the Astree label is handsomely packaged with excellent documentation. Jordi Savall’s interpretations of the two suites, which comprise Couperin’s Pieces de Viole, are free, spontaneous and sensible to the elusive nuances of what Couperin called ‘le bon gout’. Using a seven-string instrument, he plays the two elegiac preludes in supple, improvisatory vein, controls the pacing of the hypnotic ‘Passacaille ou Chaconne’ of Suite no. 1 with structural insight, realises the sombre ‘Pompe funebre’ of no. 2 with conviction and adds an endearing vivacity and elegance to ‘La Chemise blanche’. Some of the first suite’s dances lose their vital characteristics – notably the gavotte …