Reviews
Reviews
Var Matin, Août 2016, Christian Godet
« On savait que le niveau de cette édition serait exceptionnel : ces deux incroyables voix [Dima Bawab & Pauline Sikirdji]…en ont apporté la preuve »
« Un public de connaisseurs, mélomanes, amateurs et curieux de tous âges, a fortement apprécié et longuement applaudi, comme il se doit les œuvres de Gounod, Mozart, Bizet, Rossini…interprétées magistralement…par ces jeunes chanteurs déjà au sommet de leur art qu’ils ont étudié dans les plus grands conservatoires de musique mondiaux. »
« Sous la direction de Graham Ross, le chœur, l’orchestre et les solistes de Musique Cordiale ont donné une interprétation digne des plus grandes scènes d’opéra…Les quelques 300 personnes présentes leur ont réservé une standing ovation. »
« 14 jours de pur bonheur musical. »
Classical Music Magazine, September 2015, Michael White
Think Dartingdon with better weather, and you’ll get an idea; but the difference is that it’s incredibly relaxed. The August heat, the picture-book locations (everything takes place in huddled hill-towns west of Nice), the rosé, mean the usual formalities of concert-giving barely figure.
Catholic Herald, Michael White
passionately spirited performances, packed houses and the culture of extended friendship that the name suggests
On Claviers: the concerts, which have minimal formality… but a habit of delivering miracles. A good example last week was a pair of countertenors singing Purcell side by side in one of those neglected churches that you get in France…One countertenor was James Hall, a voice of velvet power that had projection but with easy, almost laid-back charm and purity of town. The other was a a fascinating curiosity: a 16-year-old Swiss boy, Constantin Emanuel Zimmemann, who ought to be too young to be the voice he is and was apparently still singing treble just a month ago. He was an outstanding treble, who recorded with Ton Koopman. And he seems to have emerged like Venus, fully formed (or very nearly)…there’s no doubting his musicianship, which is precocious. We’ll be hearing more of him, I’m sure.
Tosca: the location was magical, the orchestra heroic and the Scarpia magnificently sung by Adam Green….an achievement
France 3, Dominique Langard
Le festival qui a misé dès le départ sur l’exigence, ne se refuse aucune possibilité d’exploration. “C’est une réunion de musiciens professionnels qui acceptent de passer deux semaines dans cette région de France d’une beauté inouïe” explique Pippa Pawlik, directeur artistique du festival.
Tosca à Seillans: C’est un public plus que conquis qui a salué comme il se doit ces artistes brillants dont les voix resteront longtemps à raisonner dans leurs têtes.
Read the full article
Irish Times – Ten Wonderful Music Holidays
A series of stunning Provençale hilltop towns play host to this wonderful festival that is celebrating its 11th year in 2015. Seillance, the Pays de Fayence and neighbouring towns of the Var host more than 20 concerts of choral and orchestral work, chamber ensembles, recitals, opera and even some jazz.
The atmosphere is informal and incredibly friendly; the music is top-notch.
http://www.irishtimes.com/life-and-style/travel/holidays-2015/ten-wonderful-music-holidays-1.2041265
Last Minute Musicians, Adam Bennett 2014
Few festivals and organisations allow for both amateur and professional musicians across a broad selection of countries to rehearse and perform together, especially not in France’s most beautiful village. Musique Cordiale, a 2 week music festival does exactly this.
http://www.lastminutemusicians.com/blog/?p=768
European Festivals Guide 2012, The Arts Desk, Ismene Brown
A fortnight’s fresh, unpretentious and sociable music-making in a village near Nice between student professionals, established names and good amateurs.
Opera Now, Michael White
OUTDOOR PURSUITS – (Squillo, Main Stage)
a sharp, smart Barber of Seville directed by the multi-talented John Savournin….It was spunkily conducted too by the unflappable Mark Austin
How professionals and amateurs find common ground and make sweet music in the south of France
But the lesson of an experience like Musique Cordiale is that there are other things in music-making that count for at least as much as perfection: qualities to do with effort and commitment and communication of a sense that what you’re singing/playing truly matters to you. And on those terms, this B Minor Mass was fabulous.
I heard it twice, in different hill-town churches, played on both occasions to packed audiences that overflowed into the street outside. There was a real sense of occasion: far greater than when you go and hear a comparable concert at the Barbican or Southbank.
Res Musica Pierre-Jean Tribot
L’amitié franco-britannique se manifeste aussi dans la musique avec le festival Musique cordiale fondé et animé par Pippa Pawlik, figure incontournable de la vie musicale européenne. Opéra, musique chorale, concerto, musique de chambre mais aussi académie pour jeunes musiciens, ce jeune festival, très ambitieux, apporte une énergie rafraîchissante sur la scène estivale française.
Telegraph, Michael White
http://www.telegraph.co.uk/travel/festivalsandevents/7770820/Classical-music-festivals-2010-summer-guide.html
Almost a miniature Dartington with better weather, Musique Cordiale is now in its sixth year. The concerts involve big choirs drawn from amateur singers from both sides of the Channel who do it as a music holiday, alongside rising young professionals who do it for experience. Everybody eats communally en plein air.
The concerts, which get packed and emotional, run in Seillans, Mons, Bagnols and other characterful hill-towns of the region. This year there’s Fauré’s Requiem, Poulenc’s Salve Regina, and a lot of baroque orchestral music. Plus a production of Mozart’s Così fan tutte, under the stars in Seillans town square that, if it’s anything like last year’s Marriage of Figaro, will be pure magic.