If you’re looking for music to restore your faith in what’s good in life, look no farther. Florilegium’s pioneering Bolivian Baroque series — three superbly recorded volumes by that period instrument ensemble — contains some of the most delightful music I’ve heard in many a year.
Who might have expected that, in the midst of the Bolivian rain forest, exist more than 7,000 musical documents from the old Jesuit missionary settlements and reductions (inhabited by some 5,000 native Bolivians, together with a few members of religious orders)? What’s more, that music — or at least the pieces performed by Florilegium and a choir of handpicked Bolivian singers on three superb Channel Classics SACDs (super audio CDs) — is a joy.
Not only do the melodies and harmonies reflect the simple piety and faith transmitted by the missionaries to their willing (or unwilling) converts, but the performances are also shorn of the sophisticated trappings that we have come to associate with Western classical excellence. That is not to suggest that the musicians are anything less than first rate. But the directness of their approach, and the purity of their sound, transmits a youthful freshness that never fails to captivate.
Following on the heels of Vol. 2, which received a Gramophone Editor’s Choice and BBC Music Magazine nomination for best choir recording, Vol. 3 showcases the Arakaendar Bolivia Choir. The choir was founded in 2005 by Florilegium’s director, Ashley Solomon, in order to work with Florilegium on the Bolivian Baroque projects. Its 16 singers excel in vibratoless, pure-toned singing. The choir first performed at the Sixth International Festival of Renaissance and Baroque Music in Bolivia in April 2006, after which it recorded Vol. 2 with Florilegium and appeared on CBS-TV’s 60 Minutes on Easter Sunday, 2007. It has since undertaken a European tour with Florilegium, during which they recorded parts of Vol. 3.
Listen to the Music
Sonate Chiquitana No. IV, Allegro
Sonate d'intavolatura: All'Offertorio in C major
The SACD showcases the restored 18th-century Blockwerk organ located in the Mission Church of Santa Ana de Ciquitos deep in the rain forest. The organ’s sound — light, sweet, and entirely shorn of bombast — makes a fitting complement to the voices.
Most intriguing is the message of some of the selections. Roque Jacinto de Charvarria (1688-1719) may have written a delightful, bouncing melody for Fuera, fuera! Háganles lugar! (Get away from here!), yet his words command the Spanish conquerors to respect the Bolivian natives as equal worshippers of Jesus and to stop their mocking laughter. The title of Juan de Araujo’s Al llanto mas tierno (The most tender lament) may sound like an intro to a long-suffering, minor-key lament, but instead it sweetly requests flowers, birds, springs, and stars to stop their movement and experience the wonders of life and love on earth. Even Tomás de Torrejón y Valesco’s Missa Octavo Tono sounds less burdened with suffering than do equivalent works sung by English and German choirs.
The MP3 clips posted with this review only hint at the warm, full-range sound of this irresistible recording.