Once again, the musicians of La Follia thrilled their audience on Sunday afternoon at the Tanzmatten in Sélestat. In residence in the humanist city, La Follia chamber orchestra gave one of its three Sélestadian concerts of the year at 5pm on Sunday. In this case, they gave the New Year's concert to an almost full house at the Tanzmatten, with 395 listeners for 430 seats.
A world premiere
The concert featured the very first public performance of a work by French composer François-Bernard Mâche. Perseus, written especially for La Follia as part of a state commission, sets to music a Greek poem that sings the myth of Perseus. The hero is locked up with his mother Danae in a chest and thrown into the sea in the middle of a storm. The voice of mezzo-soprano Françoise Kubler, full of personality, has illuminated the poem by Simonides de Keos, sung in the Greek text. The strings of La Follia, accompanied by a marimba, cymbals and a slightly amplified harpsichord, served the work with their customary brilliance and loyalty. As for Perseus, the piece is... resolutely contemporary. Even if conductor Olivier Dejours, invited for this special occasion, wanted to reassure the audience.
"It may not be as easy to listen to as Strauss, but you soon get carried away. I've enjoyed Mâche's compositions for many years," he explained. Perseus is a lullaby during a storm. It sums up well the predictions for 2009," he added humorously. A dozen minutes later, the audience greeted the performance with thunderous applause. But perhaps a little less warmly than for the more classical pieces on the programme. 

                                      Jean-Louis Vuillequez, L'Alsace 13.1.09 

Sélestat / New Year's concert
A grandiose "La Follia
The instrumental ensemble 'La Follia' gave its New Year's concert at the Tanzmatten on Sunday evening, to a packed house for the premiere of François-Bernard Mâche's 'Perseus'.
...Under the direction of Olivier Dejours, the orchestra, true to its convictions, offers different works that are sometimes unfairly overlooked. ... The heart of the evening is now introduced by the conductor, who reminds us that the state commission for the piece Perseus was a request from La Follia. The work is inspired by the poem by Simonides de Keos. The cymbals and syncopated style evoke the fury of a raging sea, while Danae, Perseus's mother, sings of her despair in a moving performance by François Kubler. She then reassures her child, while the harpsichord maintains a real sense of suspense and drama that stretches right through to the finale in a plea to Zeus.
 Having completed his interpretation of this poignant, modern work, François-Bernard Mâche took to the stage to a standing ovation. 

                              PH. GR. Dernières Nouvelles D'Alsace, Tuesday 13 January 2009.

Traversée des tempêtes

The highlight of the programme was undoubtedly the premiere of Perseus, a powerful and beautiful work by François-Bernard Mâche served up by a magnificent performance by the instrumental ensemble - strings, amplified harpsichord, marimba  and cymbals  -  a n d   soprano Françoise  Kubler  under  the electrifying direction of Olivier Dejours. The piece is based on a text by Simonides of Keos, a eulogist of victories in the  fifth  century  BC.  In  his poem,  this  challenger  of Aeschylus imagines the lullaby sung  by  Danae  to  the  infant Perseus  in  the  midst  of  the unleashing  of  the  waves  to w h i c h   she  has  been thrown: - a berceuse héroïque', to use Debussy's title. The text in ancient Greek saves the mystery of its harsh phonemes but Olivier Dejours, in a few words of introduction, guided the audience, showed the 
truly  perennial timeliness of myth to an audience that  infact feels concerned by the storms of our time 
and by our children's future. And we hear, we understand everything in these fifteen rough and legible minutes : the agressions of a disoriented world launched by these boring ostinatos, these tight motifs in imitation that subdivide the desks, these frightened exclamations of the soloist. And Françoise Kubler, as a heroine plunged into terror, is a shattering presence. A conqueror of gentleness and ultimately, at the feet of Zeus, the repository of all human dignity.

                                                          Christian Fruchard

The myth of Perseus  set to music by François-Bernard Mâche, premiered at the Tanzmatten under the exceptional direction of Olivier Dejours and with mezzo-soprano Françoise Kubler. 

Once again, the musicians of La Follia thrilled their audience on Sunday afternoon at the Tanzmatten in Sélestat. 
In residence in the humanist city, La Follia chamber orchestra gave one of its three Sélestadian concerts of the year at 5pm on Sunday. In this case, they gave the New Year's concert to an almost full house at the Tanzmatten, with 395 listeners for 430 seats. 

A world premiere 
The concert featured the very first public performance of a work by French composer François-Bernard Mâche. Perseus, written especially for La Follia as part of a state commission, sets to music a Greek poem that sings the myth of Perseus. The hero is locked in a chest with his mother Danae and thrown into the sea in the middle of a storm. The voice of mezzo-soprano Françoise Kubler, full of personality, has illuminated the poem by Simonides de Keos, sung in the Greek text. The strings of La Follia, accompanied by a marimba, cymbals and a slightly ampliﬁed harpsichord, served the work with their customary brio and loyalty. 
As for Perseus, the piece is... resolutely contemporary. Even if conductor Olivier Dejours, invited for this special occasion, wanted to reassure the audience. 
"It may not be as easy to listen to as Strauss, but you soon get carried away. 
I've enjoyed Mâche's compositions for many years," he explained. Perseus is a lullaby during a storm. It sums up well the predictions for 2009," he added humorously. A dozen minutes later, the audience greeted the performance with thunderous applause. But perhaps a little less warmly than for the more classical pieces on the programme. 

                                          Jean-Louis Vuillequez.   L'Alsace 123.1.2009