Ode to the Gamba

Once I was content to strut my air guitar in pale homage to Hendrix, Green, Beck, Clapton and a dozen others. But now it's frets, fingers and bows that captivate my senses with a music that has the power to shift your temporal awareness between the here and now and another time and another place. To a man cloistered in his 17th century garden shed in philosophical discourse with his instrument, while another steals close at night to listen in secret.

That man is Monsieur de Sainte-Colombe, he plays the viola de gamba ignorant of the young pretender Marin Marias who spies upon him. This fictional (?) scene is depicted in Alain Corneau's atmospheric 1991 film “Tous les matins du monde”. It's the kind of film that perhaps only the French could make, and gives a fascinating glimpse of the lives and music of two masters of the viol.

Watch the whole film if you can, or sample the many clips on You Tube, but don't miss the soundtrack which is available on CD. It features performances by Jordi Savall, one of the foremost of modern viola de gamba players. Strictly, the viola de gamba is not a single instrument but a family that includes treble, alto, tenor, bass, and contrabass sizes. It reigned supreme for over two hundred years in consort, solo and in basso continuo - Baroque's bass section. But it's the rich tones of the sound world of the tenor and bass viol that are so beguiling. The solo piece in track 6 of the film soundtrack, “Les Pleurs (Mr de Sainte Colombe)” is just such an example, including both bowed and plucked sections where the viola de gamba takes on a harp like character. The bass viol has many voices and moods. Jordi Savall specifically refers to harp, lute and bag pipe tunings in the sleeves notes of another of his recordings, “Les Voix Humaines”. Track 8, “La Reveuse”, track 10, “L'Arabesque” and track 13, “Le Badinage” all are by Marin Marias and finds the viola de gamba at turns contemplative, melancholic and plaintive. If you have ever been struck by the raw emotion of Jacqueline du Pré's Elgar Cello Concerto, then in the right hands the ability of the viola de gamba to communicate emotion is uncanny. As a former blues lover, maybe that's why this music says something to me, perhaps it could connect with you too.

I'd be amiss to talk of the bass viol without mentioning Palo Pandolfo, another modern day virtuoso player, composer, and teacher of music for the viola de gamba. His many fine recordings include CDs of works by Marin Marias, CPE Bach, JS Bach, Tobias Hume and Sainte de Colombe. But his CD “A Solo” might be the place to start and features works that span the glorious age of the viola de gamba from Deigo Ortiz to Carl Friedich Abel.

Abel is sometimes called the “last gambist”, but this honour might better be reserved for Franz Xavier Hammer. Abel, a German, lived and worked in London for much of his life where he formed a business and musical partnership with Johann Christian Bach, the eleventh son of J.S. Bach. Abel was famed for his solo playing of the viola de gamba which had become a rarity. But his fortunes waxed and waned and by the late 18th century the viola de gamba had fallen out of fashion, the violin family totally replaced the viol in the concert halls with the gamba's six strings giving way to the cello's four.

Susanne Heinrich's award wining 2008 CD, Mr Abel's Fine Airs, brings his musical world vividly to life. You can listen to extracts of all the tracks and read the sleeve notes for free at http://www.hyperion-records.co.uk/al.asp?al=CDA67628. The many reviews speak for themselves. The emotional qualities and introspection of the viola de gamba are still here, mixed with dance rhythms and the occasional bagpipe or hurdy-grudy drone and Bach like passages. If the viola de gamba is beginning to grab your attention you'll have to put aside 77 minutes of your life, once I start listening to this it doesn't get turned off .

Rather than end here, Susanne Hienrich's recent second release on the hyperion label takes us back over a hundred years to the music of Tobias Hume. Titled “Passion & Division
The First Part of Ayres—Captain Humes Musicall Humors (1605)” it explores the viola de gamba music of Capitan Tobias Hume, soldier of fortune and gambist. Again, you can listen to extracts and read the sleeve notes for free at http://www.hyperion-records.co.uk/al.asp?al=CDA67811.

One phrase that stands out in Susanne Hienrich's notes is “Many of these works show a deep understanding of pure, translucent emotion, as if to take a magnifying glass straight to the core of one’s feelings”. If the questions is “can white men play the blues” perhaps the answer in 1605 was Hume's “I am melancholy”. Aptly, the last track is “Loves Farewell” a simple but ever so touching piece that is entirely plucked. The dropping of the apostrophe begs the question as to whether our soldier is bidding farewell to those he has loved as his ramblings force him to move on, or does he fear the loss of love and life itself?

Finally, if all this has left you cold, then perhaps you'd be surprised to know that the ruby-gamba , a solid body 7 string electrical version, brings the viola de gamba into the 21st century. It's been adopted by Jazz and other improvisers. You can find some audio samples here: http://www.ruby-gamba.com/ Try the “Tony solo”, it's a gamba Jim, but not as we know it ...


My recommendations:

Tous Les Matins du Monde – original motion picture soundtrack. AUVIDIS K 4640
Les Voix Humaines – Jordi Savall. Alia Vox AV 9803
A Solo – Paola Pandolfo. Glossa GCD 920403
Mr. Abel's Fine Airs - Susanne Heinrich Hyperion CDA67628
Passion & Division - Susanne Heinrich Hyperion CDA67811