The popularity of the film Tous les matins du monde (All the Mornings of the World) has revived the fortunes of a shadowy composer named Sainte-Colombe, who was active in the late seventeenth century. The film was largely fictitious, but subsequent research, much of it nicely summarized in the notes to this disc, has shed light on who Sainte-Colombe might have been and has actually backed up some of the guesses made by filmmakers and by novelist Pascal Quignard, on whose book Tous les matins du monde was based.

The popularity of the film Tous les matins du monde (All the Mornings of the World) has revived the fortunes of the shadowy composer named Sainte-Colombe, who was active in the late seventeenth century. The film was largely fictitious, but subsequent research, much of it nicely summarized in the notes to this disc, has shed light on who Sainte-Colombe might have been, and has shown that the filmmakers, and the novelist (Pascal Quignard) who wrote the novel on which Tous les matins du monde was based, made some good guesses about him.

Amongst the many discs recorded for ATMA, this duo is continuing their complete series of works for two violas da gamba by M'sieur Sainte-Colombe. Volume Two of this series, another 2-CD set, echoes the beautiful work done in Volume One, with seventeen more concerts (19-35). Again the players demonstrate a profound empathy with the marvels of the French viola da gamba repertoire. Their approach continues to feel just right, creating a fluid sensuous sound that reinforces the unearthly nature of this unique music.

With this first volume, Les Voix Humaines members Margaret Little and Susie Napper embark on a very ambitious cycle to record all of Sainte Colombe the Elder's 67 "Concerts a deux violes esgales" (concerts for two bass viols). On evidence of the first 18 offered here, the interpretations are consistently quicker and noticeably sunnier compared to the few other recordings of several of these pieces.

This is an excellent and varied selection of composers from the very well known like Palestrina, Monteverdi, Bach and Vivaldi, through the less famous but familiar like Frescobaldi, Sainte-Colombe and Zelenka, to the downright obscure. It is all delightful: the musicians are uniformly excellent, and include such great names as Gustav Leonhardt, Cantus Colln, Christopher Hogwood and so on. They give fine performances both of the familiar works and of the less familiar ones. Obviously there will be discs you like more than others and you may already have favourite versions of some works, but these discs are never less than very good and are often outstanding.