Lulu Presents: Marc Destrubé, Dorothee Mields’ “Heavenly Delight and Earthly Peace”

Alexander Varty

Lulu Performing Arts

Have you ever fallen in love at first listen?

I’ve just done just that. Hearing Dorothee Mields sing Johann Hermann Schein’s “Lehre uns bedenken” sent me running to the Internet to purchase a copy of the German soprano’s wonderfully titled Heinrich Albert’s Pumpkin Hut, a glorious survey of Prussian music from the 17th century. I’ve only rarely heard anyone sing early music with such emotional conviction and fully contemporary, fresh-as-a-daisy soul. The Lulu Performing Arts board must have felt much the same way. As soon as our local chamber-music presenters heard that Mields was going to have a day off on Vancouver Island, they upended her vacation plans by booking her for a rare pop-up show at the Haven Auditorium on Thursday (February 27).  It’s quite a coup, especially as Mields will perform with a quartet of early-music all-stars: La Modestine’s violinist Marc Destrubé, gambist Natalie Mackie, and harpsichordist Marco Vitale, plus guest violist Paul Wicke.

This all came about because the singer and her accompanists are playing three shows at Victoria’s Pacific Baroque Festival, and we’ll hear them immediately after they’ve warmed up in the capital. The program they’ll present is the first of the three linked concerts, and features something that the world most definitely needs right now. “I feel very lucky because I’m usually the one who bears the whole burden of the programming, but Dorothee actually conceived all three programs, with a bit of adjustment,” says the affable Destrubé. “And she also gave us a wonderful theme for the festival of ‘Peace, Friendship and Joy’. This is the ‘Peace’ program which we’re bringing to Gabriola.”

Fittingly, the show will open with the radical theologian Martin Luther’s hymn “Verleih uns Frieden gnädiglich”, enter the world of conflict and strife with Samuel Scheidt’s “Galliard Battaglia”, and culminate in the glorious revelation of Johann Sebastian Bach’s chorale “Amen! Komm, Du schöne Freudenkrone”, which Destrubé translates as “Come and see the Promised Land”.

“There is a historical arc here,” the violinist explains, “and also a musical arc that is also related to where and when the music was composed: in the area around Hamburg, which was immensely prosperous because of being a trading city.” Northern Germany, he continues, “was largely protected from the ravages of the Thirty Years War, and so it was just a wonderfully rich source of musical activity and experimentation. But of course people in general, and musicians certainly, looked for consolation, comfort, and reassurance in music.

“They looked to music to reflect the emotions that they were feeling at an intense time,” he adds, “and that’s reflected in this program.”

What emotions, one wonders, does the marvellous Mields stir up in this most accomplished musician’s soul?

“She’s just a delight,” Destrubé says. “She’s just a wonderful, open-hearted, loving, beautiful singer.”

So don’t take my word for it: trust an authority. For more information and tickets visit the Lulu Performing Arts website at www.luluperformingarts.ca