Washington Classical Review

Harpsichordist Yago Mahúgo performed French and Spanish music for Capriccio Baroque Saturday night.

Baroque music is often inextricably interwoven with national dance forms. Yago Mahúgo examined two such overlaps in his Washington debut recital Saturday evening. Capriccio Baroque presented this program of French and Spanish harpsichord music in the twilit sanctuary known as Live! at 10th & G.

The Spanish harpsichordist, who teaches at the Madrid Royal Conservatory of Music, began with an assembled suite of various pieces by François Couperin. The Prélude from Concerts Royaux No. 2 served as introduction. Pieces like this showcased the best side of Mahúgo’s playing, marked by a smooth legato articulation that softened the normally percussive sound of the harpsichord. Rhythmic flexibility further enlivened his interpretation, as did frequent changes of registration, artful ways of minimizing the dynamic sameness of this early instrument.

Mahúgo followed the Prélude with a selection of dance movements from Livres 1 and 2 of Couperin’s Pièces de clavecin, which he has recently recorded. In these pieces, he adorned repeated sections with tasteful embellishments, again adding nuance through little registration shifts. As a result the middle section of “Les Silvains” had a greater sense of intimacy than what surrounded it. Dotted rhythms brought out the vibrancy of the faster movements, like “La Bourbonnaise” and the flirtatious “La Manon.”

A more reflective style gave “La Garnier” and “Les Idées heureuses” contemplative stillness, again graced with generous rubato. Each refrain returned with a slightly different sound, adding variety. The highlight of most French dance sets, the Chaconne, came in the longer “La Favorite,” with more dotted rhythms giving the piece a pleasing swing. Premature applause seemed a good indication that this piece would have made a better ending to the set than the two pieces that followed it.

When faced with a surfeit of notes, like the extended roulades in “Les Ondes” and the slightly rushed figuration of “Les Barricades mystérieuses,” Mahúgo did not meet the same success. The same issue came across in the two dances by Pancrace Royer that followed the Couperin set. The more thoughtful “L’Aimable” sounded tasteful and beautifully varied, while the more daunting “La Marche des Scythes,” played up for its aggressive, war-like motifs, paled a bit for lack of that last measure of virtuosic aplomb.

Furthermore, the Chaconne would have made an ingenious pivot to the set of Spanish fandangos that concluded the evening. This dance, celebrated in France for use in the ballets of French opera, came from Spain by way of South America, and its repetitive harmonic pattern has some similarities to that found in the fandango. Both offer the appeal of a crescendo of technical challenges in successive variations.

Mahúgo, who has recently recorded a program devoted to the fandango, played three examples of this dance, when frankly one probably would have sufficed. Composed by Domenico Scarlatti, Luigi Boccherini, and Antonio Soler (the last two in arrangements by Mahúgo), the three pieces were not different enough from one another to hold interest. Mahúgo’s fingerwork, while generally adroit, became a little sticky in repeated-note passages, which abound in this kind of piece.

All three composers included musical ideas that evoked the guitar and castanets, hallmarks of Spanish folk music. Mahúgo collaborated with a castanet player, Pedro Estevan, on his recording, an addition that relieved the monotony. Some kind of different timbre would have helped in this setting as well.

A single sedate encore of Couperin’s lullaby “Le Dodo, ou l’amour au berceau” made a pleasing contrast. The repetition of two chords that dominates this piece recalled in a way the harmonic oscillation of the fandango, but in a much more peaceful tone.

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