Marin Marais possesses the grace, elegance and wit so appealing in the goût français of the eighteenth century. The character pieces of his last two books depict portraits, landscapes and little genre scenes in painterly fashion, and are an unsurpassed highpoint of the viol repertory.

Marais (1656-1728) was once among the least-known French baroque composers, a specialist in the viole (or viola da gamba), an instrument that was already obsolescent in his lifetime but one that he raised to unprecedented heights of technical finesse and expressive power. Now, since the film "Tous les Matins du Monde," in which his role was taken by Gerard Depardieu, his discography has risen to a full, well-deserved column in the Schwann-Opus catalogue. This beautifully styled recording of three suites and a caprice by the Charivari Agreable trio is a fine addition to his discography.

Sarah Cunningham is probably the finest viol player in Britain today, though it Is as a chamber-music player rather than as a soloist that she is best known here and abroad. Her technical command of the seven-string bass viol is never in doubt on this CD; nor, for that matter, is her control of tone. She has chosen some of Marais' most familiar and demanding works on which to make her solo recording debut, thereby inviting comparisons with the previous generation of players, Wieland Kuijken and Jordi Savall.

A veteran of Jordi Savall's Hespèrion XX and XXI, gambaist Marianne Muller makes her Zig Zag Territories debut with this disc of music by the great French Baroque composer Marin Marais. The repertoire is daunting: the ingenious and evocative Le Labyrinthe, the 32 virtuoso variations on Les Folies d'Espagne, and the 12-movement Suite in E minor from Marais' Second Book of Pièces de viole. These are works that require not just virtuosity, stamina, intense expressivity, and soulful beauty of tone.