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GRAMOPHONE (07/2025)
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Château de Versailles  : CVS163 

Code barres / Barcode : 3760385430539

Reviewer : David Vickers

Renowned for his five books of chamber cantatas, Clérambault became organist at Saint-Sulpice in 1714. The large Parisian church had been undergoing ambitious rebuilding since 1646; an eyewitness at its dedicatory service in July 1745 reported that a Te Deum ‘composed by M Clérambault’ was ‘performed by nearly one hundred musicians, the elite of Paris and Versailles’. The Namur Chamber Choir and A Nocte Temporis are less than half as numerous but produce swaying charm, melodious ease, stylistic finesse and ceremonial splendour in the Te Deum à grand choeur. Recorders, strings and solo trumpet with timpani dovetail elegantly in the opening section. Two-part choir sopranos and violins combine with airy delicacy (‘Tibi Cherubim et Seraphim’) before the full choir, trumpet and drums join emphatically in a fugue (‘Sanctus’). Artistic director Reinoud Van Mechelen’s graceful high tenor takes centre stage in the gently Italianate ‘Salvum fac populum tuum Domine’, and Guy Cutting’s ‘Dignare, Domine’ has touching sincerity. The choir contributes a range of contrapuntal piety (‘Te ergo quaesumus’) and precise energy (‘In te Domine speravi’).

L’histoire de la femme adultère is preserved in an undated manuscript. A rare example of an early 18th-century French Latin oratorio modelled on Charpentier’s Romaninfluenced histoires sacrées, perhaps Clérambault’s concise religious drama was intended for the third Saturday of Lent – when the liturgical gospel reading from John 8 was Christ’s compassionate treatment of an adulterous woman. The narrating Historien is sung serenely by Lisandro Abadie. There is eloquent poeticism from Van Mechelen’s dulcet Jésus and Gwendoline Blondeel’s sorrowful Femme adultère, whose penitence is conveyed beautifully in the lament ‘O mulier infelix’ (featuring dolorous concertante flute and violin, supported intimately by viola da gamba, theorbo and organ). Christ’s benevolent command for the adulteress to go in peace and sin no more has joyful courtliness (‘Neque ego mulier’). The chorus of Israelites contemplate Christ’s wisdom at the midway point and conclude with the moral that he does not desire the death of sinners but invites them to repent and live. These exquisite performances shed important new light on Clérambault’s sacred and devotional output.

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