Santenay

The four young musicians met in spring 2004 in the state academy of music in Trossingen (Germany). Four musicians from four different nationalities: Germany, France, Transylvania and Israel.

They soon found out that they share a common language and a common fascination with the polyphonic music of the late Middle Ages. Through playing together they have learnt to know each other, to develop their own language and their own approach to this wonderful music.

The use of instruments reconstructed based on medieval iconography allows the ensemble to approach the original soundscape. They attach great importance to the understanding of the musical language of the period, now having become foreign of today's classical musicians. Thus, a bit in the manner of a performer facing a contemporary work with a new language, it is a matter of decoding little by little the written page, to try to understand the essence of a piece, and to discover its meaning with their personal modern frames of mind.

The ensemble draws its name from the castle of Santenay, in Burgundy, a castle which constitutes for the musicians in a way a symbol of the apogee of the culture at the Burgundian court.

Before as in the present, the songs treat fundamental themes inherent in human nature. Love, happy or unhappy, the simple pleasures of life, such as the return of spring, society, but also the powerlessness of Man in the face of his destiny, his despondency sometimes, and all his emotions, touch us in the present as before. Choosing pieces which speak to them, they strive to give them a living interpretation, which projects the expressive power of the music, entirely symbiotic with the poetry of the text.

Ensemble Santenay receives counsel, support and encouragement from musicians such as Carsten Eckert, Lorenz Duftschmid and Kees Boeke.