From left: Hildegard Perl, Joel Frederiksen, Emma-Lisa Roux, Domen Marinčič
Ensemble Phoenix
(Munich, Germany)
“Est-ce Mars”
Courtly Airs from 17th Century Paris
A program of French Renaissance music
Friday, July 11, 2025 | 7:30 PM
The Indiana History Center
450 West Ohio Street, Indianapolis, IN 46202
(Pre-Concert Chat begins 30 minutes prior to concert)
In the end, it’s all about Venus and Mars - Love and War! We begin with a Ballet du Roy (Ballet to the King) by Antoine Boësset with its amusing remarks about music and a hymn to Mars for bass voice. Love songs follow - Eau vive, source d’amour, where the fire of love cannot be extinguished by water alone, N’espérez plus, mes yeux, performed with its virtuosic „doubles“, and a fight between powerful love and alluring beauty in Amour grand vainquer des vainquers. There is instrumental music for the queen by Robert Ballard and a lovely piece for the Adorable Princesse (Maria de Medici) by Pierre Guédron. A playful dialogue between a shepherd and shepherdess is followed by the masterpiece, Cessez mortelles, a song of love and praise to the undying, unchanging love of a noble woman. The concert culminates with Est-ce Mars, the melody of which became hugely popular throughout Europe, part of a Ballet pour Madame by Pierre Guédron. It was performed on 17 November 1613 in honor of Madame Élisabeth de Bourbon, a sister of the French King Louis XIII., and plays with the apparent opposition of Mars and Venus, ultimately to honor Madame Élisabeth.
Venus and Mars, love and war—the eternal dichotomy of human existence converges in these French court airs composed around 1600.
Program
Antoine Boësset (1586-1643)
Ballet du Roy. Recit de la Fe’e de la Musique.
Un concert bien mélodieux
Amour ravi de vos attraits
Il n’est si fameux Empirique
Mes combattants que Mars
Qu’on ne me rompe les oreilles
Jacques Mauduit (1557-1627)
Antoine Boesset (1587-1643)
Louis de Rigaud (fl. 1623)
Robert Ballard (c.1575–1650)
Anonym
Robert Ballard
Pierre Guédron (c. 1575-1620)
Eau vive, source d’amour
N’esperez plus mes yeux
Amour grand vainquer des vainquers
Courante de la Reyne, Unsiesme
Douce beauté
La Princesse
Adorable Princesse
Dedicated to Maria de Medici, Dans le Ballet de M. le Prince de Condé,
Feb. 22, 1615 - Poem by François Maynard
PAUSE
Jean de Castro (c. 1540 – 1611)
Pierre Guédron
Joel Frederiksen
Gabrielle Bataille (c.1574/1575–1630)
Pierre Guédron
Patoureau m’ayme tu bien
Cessez mortels de soupirer
Intervals of Love
Cette Princesse don le nom
Pour Madame
Est-ce Mars
Joel Frederiksen, director
Emma-Lisa Roux, renaissance lute
Domen Marinčič, viola da gamba
Hildegard Perl, viola da gamba