Music for St. Cecilia

St. Cecilia isn’t until Nov. 22nd (a fact known to all those of us who are sharing their life with a Catholic musician), but this can’t wait: French/German TV Channel ARTE aired a documentary by Philippe Béziat this past Sunday, Nov. 1^st. It’s called “Music for St. Cecilia” and follows Marc Minkowski and his Musiciens de Louvre through their 2009 program of music dedicated to the Saint of Music by Purcell, Handel and Haydn.

It’s amazing music, amazingly performed, and Béziat makes this amazement visible.

The film is quiet, simply letting the music speak through rehearsals, recording sessions and concerts. The camera rests repeatedly on the instruments, the hands, and, most of all, the faces of the musicians involved: it is their expressions of wonder and joy at the music happening in their midst that makes the magnitude of music itself, of performing, sharing and listening to it, palpable.

And since ARTE takes the worshipping of St. Cecilia seriously, the documentary is available for online streaming on their subchannel ARTE+7 – something that I fear stands for an availability of 7 days of the videos concerned, which would give this film just two more days.

I hope I’m wrong, though, since I plan to rewatch this more than just a few times.

Added watching reason (though really, there is none needed) for Eye Baggers: über-fabulous contralto Nathalie Stutzmann (with long hair. I kid you not.) sings in the Haydn. Also among the soloists: the previously admired Lucy Crowe, Anders J. Dahlin, Richard Croft and Luca Tittolo (and I would SO have a crush on the latter if I were a guy).

— Run, don’t walk, and do not miss!

PS. In case you missed the time limit: the treasure chest that is the YouTube channel of armycasa has the whole documentary online, starting here (13 parts in total; 4 Purcell, 5 Handel, 4 Haydn, in this order). Thanks a lot, armycasa!

~ by Anik LaChev on November 6, 2009.