CONCERTS
Every year, the Association of the Friends of the Château de Bournazel organises a rich cultural season in order to revive this jewel. The château hosts musical and theatrical events, university symposiums, artists’ residences, all of which highlight the extraordinary diversity of the European Renaissance.
PROGRAMME 2025
Saturday, 28 June - 20h
« Claude Labrèche, 1699 »
French and Italian baroque music
Aline Zylberajch, harpsichord
In 2024, the Château de Bournazel acquired a rare instrument, a harpsichord crafted in Carpentras in 1699 by Claude Labrèche. Only two instruments by this important 17th-century craftsman remain today, in Stuttgart and Bournazel.
The Bournazel instrument, which has remained virtually untouched since it was made, is listed as a Historic Monument and is being carefully protected. After a period of observation lasting several months, designed to eliminate the risks of deterioration of the wood by insects and to revise the functioning of its original mechanism, the Labrèche harpsichord will be heard again on 28 June under the fingers of Aline Zylberajch, a leading harpsichordist and teacher, particularly renowned for her in-depth knowledge of 17th-century music. An inaugural event not to be missed!
Saturday, 19 July - 20h
« Le cabaret décousu »
Philippe Meyer and his musician friends
Once again this year, Philippe Meyer and his talented friends return to Bournazel to present a new chapter in their journey through the history of French chanson. Whether it’s humorous, tragic, amorous or political, popular song always reflects changes in society. The lyrics enchant, the melodies linger in the memory, sometimes to the point of obsession.
Firmly rooted in the Aveyron region of France, Philippe Meyer is a formidable raconteur who knows every nook and cranny of the history of chanson. He excels at composing kaleidoscopic panoramas that are “disjointed”, but only in appearance…
Saturday, 4 August - 20h
« Le Tarantelle del Gargano »
Traditional song from Puglia
Pino de Vittorio, vocals and guitar
Marcello Vitale, percussion guitar
Leonardo Massa, colascione
Gabriele Miracle, percussion
Dating back to Greco-Latin antiquity in southern Italy, tarantella is a magical, therapeutic dance, emblematic of an agricultural civilisation that was both tough and extraordinarily lively, designed to ward off the mortal dangers thought to be linked to the bite of the tarantula. To nullify the spider’s venom, the dancers had to dance for hours, sometimes days, until they were exhausted, to the sound of frenzied music that drove them into a saving trance.
Pino de Vittorio, a living icon of Neapolitan song, brings this centuries-old tradition back to life. Let yourself be bewitched by the dance of the spider…
Saturday, 5 August - 20h
« Autour de la sonate Arpeggione de Schubert »
Jeanne Mathieu, viola
Alain Roudier and Ekaterina Polyakova, piano Steingraeber D232 from the Château de Bournazel collection
The Arpeggione is an experimental instrument created around 1820. Derived from the guitar, it is played with a bow, like a cello. Inconvenient to use, it did not convince either performers or composers, and was soon abandoned. Only one work was composed for it (albeit a masterpiece!), by Franz Schubert in 1824.
Of this famous sonata, which will be played here on viola, there is another version for piano four hands, hitherto unpublished. It will be presented at our concert, along with the sublime Fantasy in F minor for piano four hands.
Saturday, 6 August - 20h
« Bach, italien et français »
Benjamin Alard, harpsichord by Philippe Humeau after Gräbner, Château de Bournazel
German by birth, Bach was also deeply familiar with the Italian music of Frescobaldi, Vivaldi and Marcello, as well as with French dance music, which at the time was the unrivalled model for the whole of Europe. The ‘suite de danses’, composed of types of dance with contrasting rhythms (allemandes, courantes, sarabandes, minuets, gigues), is omnipresent in all his instrumental music.
For the harpsichord, for example, he wrote Concert italien, a veritable imaginary concerto in which the keyboard instrument is the soloist and orchestra in its own right. All the canons of the French suite are to be found in two other masterpieces, the Ouverture à la française and Partita No. 4.
Benjamin Alard, organist and harpsichordist, is indisputably one of the finest interpreters of Bach’s music today, and this is his first monumental complete recording for the Harmonia Mundi label.
Saturday, 27 September - 20h
« De la Renaissance au baroque »
Music for harpsichord from the 16th and 17th centuries
Elisabeth Joyé, virginal, spinet and Labrèche harpsichord
In the seventeenth century, instrument making took off at a phenomenal rate, while the technique of instrumentalists reached previously unthinkable levels. It was the century of keyboards.
This astonishing development had its roots in the musical language of the Renaissance. As a complement to the symposium on music organised as part of the 13th Rencontres de Bournazel, this concert will illustrate the change in aesthetic that led to the birth of the European Baroque, with works by Italian, English, Dutch, German and French composers.
For this varied musical journey, Elisabeth Joyé will play on instruments used during the Renaissance (spinet and virginal), culminating in the balance of Claude Labrèche’s original 1699 harpsichord preserved at Bournazel, a synthesis of the Renaissance and the Baroque.
Saturday, 25 October - 20h
« Bacchanale baroque »
Pieces by Marin Marais, François Couperin, Antoine Forqueray and Jean-Philippe Rameau
Alice Julien-Laferrière, violin
Mathieu Valfré, harpsichord by Philippe Humeau after Gräbner, from the Château de Bournazel
Many musicians of the Age of Enlightenment were inspired by mythology, and more particularly by the figure of Bacchus. The ancient (and therefore respectable) origins of his prowess made it possible to tackle themes that were sensitive in terms of morality or decency: grotesque laughter, debauchery, drunkenness…
Offering a space for freedom, the Bacchanalia were a central subject in art from the Renaissance to the 18th century. Inseparable allies, music and wine have been part of human daily life since the dawn of time. Alice Julien-Laferrière and Mathieu Valfré invite the audience to share the exhilaration of Baroque sounds in this intimate programme. The abundant musical repertoire on this theme provides them with inexhaustible material to evoke Bacchus, god of wine, theatre, intoxication and illusions, but also protector of trees and springtime renewal.
TARIFFS : INDIVIDUAL CONCERTS
Adults: € 30 – Under 18s: € 25
TARIFFS : PACKAGES
Package for the 3 summer concerts (4, 5 and 6 August)
Adults: € 80 – Under 18s: € 65
Package for the 9 concerts in 2025
Adults: € 225 – Under 18s: € 180
For reservations please click on the button below
Previous Concerts of 2025
Saturday, 12 April - 20h
« Etudes »
Daniel Isoir, Steingraeber D232 piano from the Château de Bournazel collection
At the beginning of the nineteenth century, the new society that had emerged from the Revolution, eager for modernity, wanted to own a piano, and to play it! With the influx of new pupils eager to learn the instrument, many composers published collections of “Études”.
Alongside their purely technical, academic output, some of these composers succeeded in adding a strong dimension of artistic invention to their pedagogical aims. These include Frédéric Chopin, who turned his “Études” into masterpieces in their own right, as well as Hélène de Montgeroult, the first woman to be appointed professor at the Paris Conservatoire in 1795, whose work, of remarkable quality, is now being rediscovered.
Saturday, 24 May - 20h
« Indiscretion »
Traditional baroque music from Ireland and Scotland
The Curious Bards:
Sarah Van Oudenhove, viola da gamba
Jean-Christophe Morel, Irish cistre
Louis Capeille, triple harp
Bruno Harlé, flutes
Alix Boivert, baroque violin & direction
The Curious Bards, an ensemble of musicians from the baroque scene with a passion for Celtic music, invites you to discover a repertoire from Scotland and Ireland that has spanned the ages.
The characterful Scottish strathspey and the fast-paced Irish slip-jigs will alternate with hornpipes, particularly popular and used by Handel himself! Moving ballads and traditional pieces revisited by composers of the period (variations, harmonisations…) will punctuate these suites of exalted dances to complete this enchanting journey to the Gaelic lands of the 18th century.
A programme that will take you right to the heart of the Celtic and Gaelic soul, and leave your feet tapping!
2024 - Programme Musical
Océane Deweider, Gabrielle Resche, Noémie Lenhof, le Cabaret Décousu, Terpsycordes, Pierre Hantaï, Pernelle Marzorati et Les Kapsber’girls
2023 - Programme Musical
Hopkinson Smith, les Sacqueboutiers, le Cabaret Décousu de Philippe Meyer, Jeanne Mathieu and Alain Roudier, Olga Pashchenko, Ensemble Phaedrus, Théâtre de l’Incrédule et le Poème Harmonique
2021 - Programme Musical
Le Cabaret Décousu de Philippe Meyer, Bor Zuljan, Tasto Solo et Benjamin Alard
2020 - Ensemble Tasto Solo - « Virtuosity and Refinement at the turn of the Renaissance »
Three concerts by an ensemble now central to the European cultural landscape, featuring repertoires from the 14th, 15th and 16th centuries.
2019 - Ensemble Tasto Solo - Anna Inglese
Concert dedicated to Anna Inglese, one of the few professional singers working in Italy in the 15th century, whose “soft and subtle voice, not human but divine” had been noted in 1455.
2019 - Carte blanche to the La Lyra ensemble
Three concerts devoted to the extraordinary evolution of keyboard instruments during the Renaissance, through three original and rare approaches.
2018 - Keyboards in the Renaissance
Ensemble TASTO SOLO (Guillermo Perèz, organetto, David Catalunya, clavisimbalum and Angélique Mauillon, renaissance harp) Enea Sorini, tenor and Corina Marti, Renaissance harpsichord Pierre Hantaï, harpsichord
2017 - Ensemble Doulce Mémoire
Made up of a team of faithful and close-knit musicians and singers, the Doulce Mémoire ensemble has been involved for more than twenty-five years in artistic adventures that are always innovative, with the regular participation of actors and dancers.
Click on the title for the link to YouTube
Crédit photographique : Robin .H. Davies
The Association of the Friends of Château de Bournazel was created in January 2012 with the aim of promoting this exceptional Historic Monument by organising cultural events contributing to the enhancement of the artistic heritage of the Renaissance. The Association, through its actions, aims to encourage the reception of the public but also of researchers specialising in the period. In the same way, the association provides human, material and financial support for the conservation, restoration, protection and accessibility of the Château.
To support the Association and participate in the development of Château de Bournazel, become a member.
