Destinées in Bloomington, MN

The contributions of women composers during the Italian Baroque are finally being documented on recordings, but much less work has been done with the French Baroque in this regard. Baroque violinist
Sophie de Bardonnèche
helps fill this lacuna with this recording of 17th and 18th century works that are never less than enjoyable and frequently fascinating. The exception to the general neglect has been
Elisabeth Jacquet de la Guerre
(1665-1729), who is represented here by a pair of sonatas. Sonatas, at least, is what they are called, but they also contain French dance suite movements, and they handle the mixture beautifully, with zippy Presto pieces set against melancholy sarabandes that
Bardonnèche
speculates may relate to the various personal tragedies the composer experienced. Equally interesting are the works by the other composers, ten of them in all. These are all extremely obscure; most of the composers are known only by part of a name (such as "
Mademoiselle Laurant
"), and most of them are here receiving their world premieres.
notes that "finding the scores of these female composers was not at all straightforward." Sample the pieces from a 1736 collection by a
Mademoiselle Duval
called
Les Génies ou les Caractères de l'Amour
. (Try the Rondeau from this set, with its unusual rhythm.) One of the few possible complaints here is that there was room on the album for more of these, and it might have been nice to hear a few others so as to better appreciate this composer's obvious programmatic gift. The performers are all crack Baroque players, and the imaginative keyboard work of
Justin Taylor
really stands out. The
Alpha
label's engineers seem to be gravitating toward the Église allemande de Paris, and this is a shame, for it is an unidiomatic space that picks up all kinds of extraneous noise. It doesn't matter much, however, for the music here will be a delightful discovery for those who hear it. ~ James Manheim