THE VIEW FROM FEZ: Jordi Savall scores for Spain.

Wednesday, June 07, 2006

Jordi Savall scores for Spain.

As far a majority of the audience were concerned, yesterday saw the best afternoon concert of the festival so far. Jordi Savall and the Hespèrion XXI Ensemble have been producing great recordings over many years and so it was an immense pleasure to finally see the group perform live. Savall was given a huge welcome to the stage and from the moment he tuned one of his ancient instruments – so old it looked like an archaeological relic – the tone was set for a wonderful performance.

Savall was boosted to international fame through his participation with Alain Corneau in the remarkable film Tous les Matins du Monde. His immense knowledge of early music and instrumentation makes him a unique figure and when he teamed up with Montserrat Figueras (pictured below) to form Hespèrion XXI the stage was set for a period of great creativity, with (to date) more than 160 CDs produced.

Monserrat’s authoritative interpretations of medieval, Renaissance and Baroque music are justifiable world famous and at the Batha Museum she delivered a powerful and flawless performance. Her ability to switch between languages, (Berber, Arabic and ancient Spanish dialects, just to name a few) with seeming ease and her mastery of ancient singing techniques never became technical, but rather a springboard for her own personal style.

The repertoire ranged across the full spectrum of early Mediterranean music – Arabo-Andalusian, Christian and Sephardic. There was also a wonderful performance of a single tune that appears in Iranian, Turkish and several other cultures and was sung in the various languages by Driss el Maloumi (pictured above ), the groups oud player and Begoña Olavide (pictured below) who also played the salterio. A duet between the two of them, singing the words in different languages was quite extraordinary.

The other members of the ensemble, flautist Pierre Hamon, Dimitri Psonis (santur and morisca) and Pedro Estevan on percussion were joined – to the delight of the locals - by a Fassi percussionist (pictured below).