2017-11 ICMA finalists

ICMA – Finalists

2017-11 ICMA

BAROQUE VOCAL
From the initial 19 nominations the following three releases have been admitted to the finals

Farinelli – A Portrait
Ann Hallenberg, Les Talens Lyriques, Christophe Rousset
Aparté
AP117

The Händel Album
Händel: Arias
Philippe Jaroussky, Artaserse
Erato
190295774455

Bach: St Matthew Passion
J. Gilchrist, S. Loges, H. Morrison, Z. Brookshaw, C.Ashley, R. Mobley, E. Minney, H. Hymas, A. Riches, A. Ashworth, J. Sells
Monteverdi Choir, Trinity Boys Choir, English Baroque Soloists
John Eliot Gardiner
Soli Deo Gloria
SDG 725

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2017-10-28_02 featured press

Le Figaro – Philippe Jaroussky et ses musiciens rendent hommage à Senesino

2017-10-28, Le Figaro, by Thierry Hillériteau

Au théâtre des Champs-Élysées, le contre-ténor français revient à ses premières amours : Haendel. Sauf que le compositeur est ici abordé par son versant le plus méconnu, au fil de plusieurs des rôles dédiés au castrat senesino.

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2017-10-27_02 featured press

Le Parnasse Musical – The Handel Album. Philippe Jaroussky, contre-ténor. Ensemble Artatserse.

2017-10-17, Le Parnasse Musical

Handel l’a développé. Jaroussky l’a perfectionné. […]

Tous les drames de la vie et ses triomphes dans un seul et unique disque. Gloria alle Handel! […]

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2017-10-27 featured press

ON Magazine – CD : The Händel Album, Arias d’opéras par Philippe Jaroussky

2017-10-27, On Magazine, by Jean-Pierre Robert

C’est que le contre-ténor français, qui se coule dans le schéma habituel en pareille circonstance d’alternance de morceaux lyriques et virtuoses, privilégie l’intériorité, où chaque phrase fait sens. Ce qui n’est pas sans rappeler la manière de Cecilia Bartoli. Ainsi de la caractérisation du tragique désespoir dans l’aria tirée de Siroe ou dans la cavatine pastorale d’Amadigi di Gaula, ici avec deux flûtes obligées, évoluant essentiellement dans le registre piano en une cantilène souple et dense. La flexibilité de la ligne de chant, on l’apprécie encore dans le grand soliloque émotionnel de la scène de suicide de Tolomeo, traduisant un homme vacillant, alors que les cordes évoquent les faibles battements de cœur après que le personnage ait absorbé le poison mortel, et ce jusque dans l’expression des derniers soupirs pianissimo.  […]

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2017-10-25 featured press

Baroquiades – Jaroussky – Haendel

2017-10-25, Baroquiades, by Marina Somers

Longuement ovationnés à l’issue de leur prestation, les musiciens gratifient le public par trois rappels. Le premier est l’air pathétique Qual nave smarrita issu de Radamisto, dans lequel ce dernier pleure son destin, et que le contre-ténor interprète avec tendresse. Au deuxième rappel, l’air Si, la voglio e l’otterò (je la veux et je l’aurai), de Serse, Philippe Jarouskky apporte sa traditionnelle note d’humour avec une interprétation dramatique, suite à laquelle il feint son emportement et quitte la salle. Le troisième rappel Ombra mai fu – sans doute un des airs baroques les plus chantés – dans lequel il excelle encore, est également issu de Serse et conclut ce concert d’une beauté poignante et d’une extraordinaire qualité vocale et musicale. […]

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2017-10-24 featured press

Berliner Morgenpost – Ein Countertenor auf der Suche nach verlorenen Schätzen

2017-10-24, Berliner Morgenpost, by Felix Stephan

 

Dass der französische Sängerstar damit recht erfolgreich ist, liegt wohl an ihm selbst: Er beherrscht die Kunst der Publikumsverführung in seinen besten Momenten so perfekt, dass man ihm unmittelbar glauben möchte, man höre kostbarste Musik. Und Jaroussky tut dies bevorzugt mit langen, leisen Tönen. Mit Tönen, die so rein und so zart sind, so unschuldig und entwaffnend, dass man ihnen nur noch wie gebannt zuhören kann. Auch an diesem Abend in der Philharmonie gibt es diese Zaubertöne wieder – anlässlich seiner Europa-Tournee mit Rezitativen und Arien aus unbekannteren Händel-Opern. […]

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2017-10-23 featured press

MDR Kultur – Philippe Jaroussky spürt rare Händel-Opern auf

2017-10-23, MDR Kultur, by Heidi Eichenberg und Grit Schulze

Insgesamt singt Jaroussky Arien aus zehn verschiedenen Opern, die sein ganzes Stimm- und Gefühlsspektrum aufzeigen: von lyrischer Zerbrechlichkeit – wenn er in “Siroe” die ungerechten Götter anfleht, die ihn zum Tode geweiht haben oder in “Ombra cara” den Schatten seiner verlorenen Geliebten beweint – über glückseligen Liebestaumel bis hin zur rasenden Eifersucht. Sein Ensembles Artaserse trägt ihn dabei musikalisch auf Händen.  […]

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2017-10-22_02 featured press

Deutschlandfunk – Herzenswunsch erfüllt

2017-10-22, Deutschlandfunk, by Christiane Lehnigk

Philippe Jaroussky hat seine erste CD mit Händel-Arien veröffentlicht. Er legt dabei den Fokus auf unbekannte Arien. Der Countertenor zeigt sich auf der Höhe seiner Stimmkultur, einzig der Sound der Aufnahme ist allzu voluminös für die fein nuancierte Opernmusik. […]

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2017-10-22_03 featured press

La Dépêche – Philippe Jaroussky:«Haendel, Vivaldi, étaient des machines à tubes»

2017-10-22, La Dépêche, interview by Sébastien Dubos

Vous avez créé votre académie, c’est une manière de tendre la main à des jeunes qui ne pourraient pas accéder à cet univers ?

Il y a deux projets. Le projet plus social, pour apporter la musique classique dans des foyers qui n’auraient pas forcément pensé ou qui n’en auraient pas les moyens. ça, c’est le projet pour les enfants. C’est la première cette année, on a ouvert la classe au violon, violoncelle et piano. On a 23 enfants qui commencent totalement un de ces trois instruments. Tout est gratuit, on leur prête l’instrument et on leur offre deux heures par semaine de cours. L’idée est qu’ils progressent rapidement. De l’autre côté, un volet plus classique, quelque chose de pré-professionnel l’idée est d’aider les jeunes à rentrer dans la vie active après les études. Pour les musiciens comme pour les autres, l’arrivée sur le marché du travail, c’est un peu un parcours de combattant, notre idée est de leur fournir de l’expérience, de les aider à entrer de plain-pied dans ce métier de musicien. Pendant un an on leur donne aussi une certaine philosophie de ce métier. […]

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2017-10-22 featured press

Der Tagesspiegel – “When I’m ironing, I forget about singing.” – Translation to English

2017-10-22, Der Tagesspiegel, by Susanne Kippenberger

“Ich will mein Hemd selber glätten. Dabei vergesse ich das Singen, höre auf, meine Stimme zu prüfen – ich bügle mein Hirn.”

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*This is a fan translation. If you have any problems with this being online, just drop us a line and we’ll remove it immediately. Translation by Lankin*

“When I’m ironing, I forget about singing.”

He is an enthusiastic traveler, dreams of his time-out in South America. Why Philippe Jaroussky, divinely gifted countertenor, does not want to be a slave to his voice.

Interview: Susanne Kippenberger

Monsieur Jaroussky, you sang at the inaugural ceremony of the Elbphilharmonie, were artist in Residence at the Konzerthaus in Berlin, have been awarded the Echo Klassik in the category “Singer of the Year” twice …

… sometimes I almost feel like the Germans adopted me. Right after France, it’s the country where I perform most often.

At the Berlin Philharmonic hall, you are doing a concert with arias by Georg Friedrich Händel. What is so fascinating about him?

He is the best! His harmonies are just so much richer than those of all the operatic composers of his time; there is a true dialogue between voice and orchestra. And what really moves me, is that sometimes I sense the admiration he had for certain singers. I also love the inconsistency. Händel was notorious for his difficult character, was said to be choleric, but his music has something very sensitive, sensual, and sweet to it.

On a tour like this one, you travel from one city to another. Quite exhausting.

I have an important ability: I can sleep well. Ten, twelve hours. While you sleep, your vocal chords take a rest. Before a concert, I don’t get up before noon, talk to no one after I wake up for two more hours, slowly wake up my body and only sing a few exercises. At the day of the concert, it is my job to do nothing. Perfect! Because I’m lazy. I am aware of my privilege – you can do what you like, no one is sitting next to you and pressures you to anything. Many people don’t even know that feeling, have family, are running around.

You must be joking about the laziness. You recorded thirty albums, to name only one thing!

I am curious! All the time, I have new projects in my head which I would absolutely like to do. There is a lot of talk that the CD is dying as a medium, but at the same time, a lot of them are being recorded. Maybe it’s just because of that – before it’s over.

To catch you at your home in Paris is luck of the draw.

I just returned from a two-week concert tour. First thing I had to do was cook. I had enough of restaurants and room service.

So what was it for dinner?

Pot-au-feu, that takes long to make, lovely. Cooking is a good method to let your mind go blank; there is nothing else you think about while you’re cooking. That’s why I always ask for an iron in my dressing room. I want to iron my own shirts. I am forgetting about singing then, stop checking on my voice – I am ironing my mind.

You are known for your outfit: black shirt, black tie, black jacket.

In Baroque ensembles, most musicians wear black. When I dress like them, I become a part of them. I consider my voice to be sort of another instrument. Also it highlights the hands and the face. Black signals sobriety, it guides the focus more towards the music.

You used to play a proper instrument: the violin. How would you compare the two?

In the beginning, maybe I treated my voice too much like an instrument, focused too much on technique, rhythm, phrasing. I didn’t really know how it worked, to express words, and being authentic. Especially when it comes to opera, we often exaggerate; there is permanent crisis, big drama. However, you have to get a clear idea of what you really want to say. Now I want to share this with young musicians; that’s why I founded my academy.

At the school on the outskirts of Paris there is not only a program for young musicians but one for children as well. Quite uncommon, or isn’t it?

In my family, no one made any music. If I didn’t have this one teacher at school who told my parents: “I believe Philippe has to make music,” I never would have done it. It changed my life! I want to give children the opportunity – children with difficult circumstances, immigrants as well – to get in contact with classical music. There are a lot of sports projects in the Banlieues of Paris. That’s great! However, there are also children who aren’t natural athletes, but have a musical talent.

And everyone is happy in the end?

Of course there are going to be difficulties. Some will give up. The program is intense; the children who learn the piano, the violin or the cello should be kept on track by the progress they make. I want them to be surprised about themselves. They will quickly move on to real music – not stupid exercises, but little pieces by Mozart or Schubert.

When did you know that you wanted to be a musician?

When I was eleven, I started playing the violin. Music totally fascinated me; I played incessantly. With 16, I knew that at least I wanted to try to become a musician.

And your parents supported you?

Yes, yes! A lot!

Your own story is a great surprise: you were studying composition, when you were sitting at the concert of a countertenor, and you decided: That’s what I want to do as well! What made you so sure?

That’s hard to explain. I hadn’t even sung in a choir before. At home, I sang a bit higher than most, and for a violinist, high notes have a certain attraction. When I heard Fabrice de Falco sing the Händel arias, deep down, I had this feeling: That’s mine! It’s a calling. That voice called out to me. Basically, it took one evening for me to reach the decision to become a countertenor. It needs to be said that I wasn’t particularly happy as a violinist. Again and again I got to hear that I had been starting too late. The biggest part of the lessons was spent on technique. As a singer, you talk about the body a lot. After all, your voice is inside there.

And, how was it?

When at 18 I started singing, I was enthusiastic like I’d never experienced it when I played any instrument. But the vocal range hit closest to my personality. I can give more of myself, of my soul.

Can you be more specific?

Well, we all have a masculine and a feminine side, and as a countertenor, you accept that. There are people who find that a man shouldn’t sing like that, that it was ridiculous – for others, it’s magical. Often we hear that we sound like women, but that’s not true. I rather noticed that many of my colleagues have something utterly boyish about themselves. Me too! Even at almost 40. Maybe the voice has a part in preserving that quality.

As a singer, does aging frighten you?

Of course, the voice is changing, is getting bigger, lower. Maybe you lose in terms of flexibility and agility. If you want to keep the two, you have to work on it. On the other hand, young singers often exaggerate in their acting. As you get older, it becomes more natural.

But isn’t it a threat, in the end?

I met a lot of singers who were devastated when they lost their voice. They had spent all their lives with it – and suddenly, they can’t do it anymore. That’s one of the reasons why I founded the academy and why I’m conducting as well. I was a musician before I became I singer, and I will remain one after I quit singing. When I’m telling my fans that I am not quite sure whether I’ll sing yet in ten years’ time, they’re shocked. I like the idea – that I could stop, that there is a limit. It makes me enjoy the moment even more.

It must be hard, to decide when the moment to quit has finally arrived.

I don’t want to be a slave to my voice. That’s why I took a sabbatical a few years ago, three quarters of a year. The first two months, I was feeling guilty that I wasn’t singing. After four month, I felt like I could quit forever. I thought, maybe it’s not as important as I’d always thought, after all; there are other important things in life.

How did that change your voice?

It’s like rebooting a computer. It’s also important for me not to become a music machine – traveling from one concert to the next, cash the money, and next stop – to stay fresh.

Wasn’t it a huge issue, to take some time off? You are booked years in advance.

In fact, that’s what makes it simple. I already know when I’ll be taking my next time-out: start of 2019, five months.

And what will you be doing in that sabbatical?

Traveling! I’m addicted. Spend the winter in South America. I enjoy speaking Spanish, and I like the culture there. The population is very young; there is this incredible energy. People are enjoying the present, they dance and sing in the streets. 

And that’s what you’ll be doing?

Maybe not. But the energy is contagious. The people there touch my heart; they are generous, enthusiastic.

But you’re on the road all the time anyway.

On a concert tour, I never have any time to go sightseeing, to really take time to see friends. When you are touring with an orchestra, you cannot just splice in a day off in between – that would be far too expensive. And as a singer, you become a baby. You’re being pampered, they pick you up at the airport, they bring you something to eat, you don’t have to care about anything. When you travel by yourself, no one knows who you are; you don’t get any special treatment.

And you really enjoy that?

Yes! Sometimes, people are even gruff. That’s life, isn’t it? When you’re a singer, everyone is so nice – but maybe only because you are a singer. That’s why it’s important to get back to reality.

How do you manage to maintain relationships, friendships?

I have been together with my partner for ten years now, and it works out well. However, he rather adjusts his life to mine than vice versa. Obviously, I cannot do my job from home. It’s more difficult when it comes to friends, even family.

Are your parents still living in the suburbs of Paris, where you grew up?

My mother, yes. My father died last year. He was 74. It was very quick, cancer, there was nothing that could be done. To lose a parent is a big cut. I had so much luck – a loving family, success, friends, a nice life in Paris, travels. Until then, I’ve always been sheltered, nothing really bad ever happened to me. His death has marked a huge change. Positive. We keep complaining about one thing or the other, and don’t even realize what a gift life is. And suddenly, someone who you love dies. His death has given me a certain distance, a new perception of what is important and what isn’t. That extends to the stage of course. I try to represent less, and just be there. It might shock you, but I got the feeling that I sing better now. With more depth to it.

Music is extremely emotional.

That’s right, but we have to have more confidence in the music, not push to the front. A conductor once told me: Maybe we should just sing the notes. Like they are written there. I am a huge Ella Fitzgerald fan. She just sings the right note, no more, no less. She is herself.

Your repertoire also contains religious pieces. Do you feel connected there?

I don’t believe in God, but I do have a connection to sacred music, to its spirituality. Maybe even more than I feel towards opera. There you are playing a role. It’s hard for me anyway, to be someone else, and that’s what opera is about of course – you have to become king, lover, murderer. Whether sacred music is about more than just yourself. It’s more universal.

On tour, you live the life of a businessman. You’re flying business class, stay in business hotels. When you’re in Paris, are you living more of an artist’s life?

Oh yes. That’s one of the reasons why I love this city so much. Even if the life there is a bubble too. I go to organic restaurants, try to live environmentally conscious, but on the other hand I am traveling by plane all the time – a disaster for the planet. I’m full of contradictions, like everyone. You have political ideas, and do the exact opposite.

Just the quarter where you live – diverse, lively – has been targeted in the 2016 attacks. Are you more afraid these days?

Back then, the possibility that a woman like Le Pen could become president truly terrified me. In my everyday life, I am not afraid. I’m only a little bit nervous when it comes to flying. But sometimes I think: I could die tomorrow – I’ve been leading such an intense life. Maybe it’s also connected to my father’s death, that since then I got the feeling: everything that’s happening now is an extra. That’s wonderful. What I am doing from now on is pure joy.

Philippe Jaroussky, 39, is considered the best countertenor of our times. Both critics and audiences celebrate the “Man for the Angel Fach” (Süddeutsche) – for the ease of his singing as well as for the versatility of his repertoire (from Baroque to French songs), and his genuine appearance. In 2008, Jaroussky was the first countertenor to be awarded the Echo Klassik “Singer of the Year” – a prize he was re-awarded in 2016. The Frenchman, raised in the suburbs of Paris, only started singing at 18. Before, he had been playing the violin and the piano as well as studied composition. In 2002, Jaroussky – who even has an asteroid named after him – founded his own chamber ensemble, the “Ensemble Artaserse.” Just now, he inaugurated an academy, located in the new concert hall “Seine Musicale” on the outskirts of Paris, teaching young professional musicians as well as children from low-income backgrounds. This Sunday, on 22nd October, the countertenor is giving a concert at the Berlin Philharmonic hall. He will be performing the program of his new CD: Arias by Georg Friedrich Händel (Erato/Warner Classics.) During the talk at a bistro in his quarter in Paris, close to the Place de la République, the musician – sweat shirt, five-o’clock shadow – was radiating enthusiasm. Despite the first grey hairs, he has an air of boyishness and relaxedness about him. The singer also told us about the origin of his distinctly not French name: his great-grandfather was leaving Russia, and told the border guard “Ya ruski” – I’m russian.

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