Joan of Arc, Battles and Prisons – Montserrat Figueras, soprano/ Louise Moaty, Rene Zosso, Manueal Weber, narrators/ La Capella Reial de Catalunya/ Hesperion XXI/ Jordi Savall, director – Alia Vox multichannel SACD AVSA 9891 A+B (2 discs), 67:39, 66:54 [Distr. by Harmonia mundi] ***:
This is yet another well-produced, documented, and performed book-like set from Savall and company, who currently produce some of the finest sets and SACDs available. How he gets the funding to put things like this out I will never understand, but I am glad he does. And the frequency with which they appear is astounding, each and every one an event. This one however, is a little different; instead of a fully-fledged documentary about the music(s) of a certain historical time period we are treated to a re-creation of the life and drama surrounding Joan of Arc, and her important part in the Hundred Year’s War.
Savall has drawn from the actual chronicles and trial documents surrounding the fate of the young girl, and weaves this narration—quite literally—among music that at least gives the “flavor” of the period. I say flavor because much of this is actually arranged by Savall himself, after Dufay, or anonymous, or the L’Homme arme melody (which is heard in so many versions I really got tired of it). And in some instances he just plain composes music not after anyone in particular, but his own “period” compositions. It’s not that this is bad, and to be fair there is a lot of music by known composers of the time that is exceptionally well-played. But the whole gives the impression of some sort of musical drama that has to be sampled from beginning to end in order to be understood.
And that leads to the next issue—understanding. All of the narration—and there is a lot of it—is completely in French, and those not prolific in that language will have difficulty following the action, which is a critical component of this whole production. I found it fantastically frustrating, enjoying many of the musical interludes but only able to follow by reading the printed texts in the book, which is hardly optimal. [And it’s definitely not “slow French” like NPR is beginning to offer…Ed.]
Musical and production values are high like usual, but this one is just not as universally attractive as most of Savall’s productions. For those who read French easily, add another star.
—Steven Ritter
Randy Newman – Pleasantville: Original Motion Picture Score –Varèse Sarabande
Randy Newman’s movie score gets a welcome vinyl upgrade.