Les Voix Humaines

Fantaisies & Fugues

Territory represented: international

Wonderful program by Les Voix humaines Consort of Viols. Mélisande Corriveau and Elin Söderström join Susie Napper et Margaret Little to make you hear some of the most beautiful and strong pieces of the Baroque Repertoire: Fantasias by Henry Purcell (CD by ATMA Classique) and excerpts of The Art of Fugue by JS Bach (CD release in 2011).

The Sun Queen

Territory represented: international

Who is the Sun Queen? You got it, it is the Viola da Gamba, favorite musical instrument of Louis the XIV, the Sun King himself! Viola da gamba duo Les Voix humaines (Susie Napper and Margaret Little) invite you in the King’s intimacy of his “salon” to listen to the music he loved so much. Works by Marais, Ste-Colombe, Couperin, Corrette and Lebègue.

Les Voix Humaines

Territory represented: international

Montreal’s internationally acclaimed viola da gamba duo and now also a viola da gamba consort.

Their musical complicity has been compared to the skill of two trapeze artists or the telepathic communion of a pair of jazz saxophonists! Susie Napper and Margaret Little, the two gambists of Les Voix Humaines, have been thrilling audiences worldwide with dashing performances of early and contemporary music for viols since 1985. They are renowned for their spectacular arrangements of a wide variety of music for two viols and have become a world reference for the music of Sainte-Colombe. After being awarded a Diapason d’Or for their fourth volume of Sainte-Colombe’s Concerts a deux violes esgales, they just received the Opus Award 2007 for Performer of the year from the Conseil québécois de la musique.

Les Voix Humaines has invited prestigious artists to join them in concert and recordings, such as Wieland and Barthold Kuijken, Charles Daniels, Suzie LeBlanc, Rinat Shaham, Matthew White, Eric Milnes, Skip Sempe and Stephen Stubbs. The duo is regularly joined by some of Montreal’s finest young gambists to form the Voix Humaines Consort of viols specializing in the vast 17th-century repertoire for viol consort and presents joint projects with Les Voix baroques (Matthew White’s vocal ensemble).

Les Voix Humaines has recorded over thirty discs which have received critical acclaim and prestigious awards (Diapason d’or, Choc du Monde de la Musique, Repertoire-Classica 10, Goldperg 5, Classics Today 10/10, Prix Opus, etc). They include the complete Poeticall Musicke of Tobias Hume, The 4 Seasons of Christopher Simpson, the complete Le Nymphe di Rheno of Johannes Schenck, several discs with soprano Suzie LeBlanc and countertenor Daniel Taylor, a Telemann disc with renowned Belgian flutist Barthold Kuijken and a Marais disc with world famous gambist Wieland Kuijken. Their recording of the complete Concerts a deux violes esgales by Sainte-Colombe (4 double CDs) is a world premiere. Les Voix Humaines record for the ATMA label.

The duo has toured in North America, Mexico, Europe, Australia, New Zealand and Israel, performing is prestigious festivals such as Early Music Vancouver, the Festival Internacional Cervantino, the Brighton International Music Festival, the Festival Oude Musiek, Holland, the Boston Early Music Festival, the Summer Festivities of Early Music in Prague and the Israel Festival.