NEVERMIND

Ensemble

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Anna Besson
Louis Creac’h
Robin Pharo
Jean Rondeau

The love and passion of ancient repertoire and music from all horizons led Anna Besson, Louis Creac’h, Robin Pharo and Jean Rondeau to create Nevermind in 2013. Together, their mission is to share the works they love with a wide and varied audience, championing and transcending the quartet repertoire (flute, violin, viola da gamba and harpsichord) of the seventeenth and eighteenth centuries. Nevermind’s numerous concerts have only reinforced their conviction and the friendship shared by these four musicians emanates through their passion and sincere love of playing, as is evidenced in the striking complicity of their collaborations.

At the core of Nevermind’s 2024/25 season are J. S. Bach’s Goldberg Variations, arranged for baroque quartet for the first time by the ensemble; Nevermind will perform this seminal baroque masterpiece at the Philharmonie de Paris, Amsterdam Concertgebouw, Wigmore Hall, Musikfest Bremen, Festival La Chaise Dieu, Opera de Rennes, Liszt Ferenc Academy of Music Budapest, Espacio Turina Seville, Bergen International Festival, Bachfest Leipzig, and Haapsalu Early Musik Festival. A highlight of Spring 2025 is Nevermind’s North American tour, which includes featured appearances at Carnegie Hall, Philadelphia Chamber Music Society, San Diego Early Music Society, Boston’s Isabella Stewart Gardner Museum, and Vancouver Recital Society. Nevermind also continues to showcase the work of 17^th-century composer Elizabeth Jacquet de la Guerre with concerts at the Auditorio Principe Felipe in Oviedo and the Auditorio Nacional de Música in Madrid.

September 2021 saw the highly anticipated release of Nevermind’s third album recorded for the Alpha / Outhere label, which delves into the quartets of Carl Philipp Emanuel Bach. The group’s previous album Quatuors Parisiens was dedicated to the work of Georg-Philipp Telemann and was released in 2017 by Alpha / Outhere following a residence at the Abbaye aux Dames de Saintes. Nevermind’s first album with Alpha / Outhere, Conversations, was released in 2016 with the aim of giving an insight on French quartets from the first half of the 18^th century, highlighting almost completely unknown pieces composed by two virtuoso violinists: Jean-Baptiste Quentin and Louis-Gabriel Guillemain.

Nevermind have showcased their virtuosity at prestigious venues across Europe including the Auditorium of the Louvre, Wiener Konzerthaus, Wigmore Hall and the Barbican in London, Amsterdam’s Concertgebouw and Muziekgebouw, BOZAR Centre for Fine Arts in Brussels, Elbphilharmonie Hamburg, Konzerthaus Dortmund, Deutsche Staatsoper Berlin, Alte Oper Frankfurt, Centra Nacional de Difusión Musical in Madrid, the Théâtre des Champs-Elysées in Paris, Muziekcentrum De Bijloke in Gent, Concertgebouw Brugge, and the Salle de Musique in la Chaux-de-Fonds. Their international tours have also taken them as far afield as the United States, Canada, Russia, Iceland, and the Far East; notable highlights include the Boston Early Music Festival, Oberlin Conservatory in Ohio, Hong Kong City Hall, and a highly successful tour of Australia in 2019 with visits to Melbourne, Sydney, Canberra, Adelaide, Newcastle and Brisbane. A typical Summer season will also see them perform at numerous festivals, with past appearances at the Rheingau Musik Festival, Utrecht Early Music Festival, the Schleswig-Holstein Musik Festival, Prague Spring Festifal, Festival Ravel, Festival of Saintes, Bel-Air Claviers Festival, and Gstaad Menuhin festival in Switzerland.

The Quartet delved into the world of contemporary music for the first time in 2019 and launched works for violin, flute, viola da gamba and harpsichord entitled La Harpe de David, especially composed for Nevermind by Philippe Hersant. The work was premiered at the International Festival of Sacred and Baroque Music of Froville, the Saintes Festival, the La Chaise-Dieu Festival and the Sinfonia Festival in Périgord.

Sonata for Trio No. 3 in D major by Elisabeth Jacquet de la Guerre - Wigmore Hall

Nevermind Conversations album © alpha classics

Nevermind TELEMANN Quatuors Parisiens © alpha classics

Nevermind J. S. Bach: Trio Sonata no. 5 in C Major BWV 529 (Allegro) © Muzyka w Raju

Nevermind performs "La Marianne" from Suite IV in B-flat major by Marin Marais © Boston Early Music Festival

Nevermind Chaconne (Modéré) - Georg Philipp Telemann © Nevermind

“Splendid, luminous music […]. Besson’s flute was all delicacy […] as was Creac’h, with brilliance, agility and sensitivity in the most moderate dynamics. The continuo was superb, with Pharo owning the springs of rubato and Rondeau making the silences sing.”

Andrés Morena Mengibar | Diario de Sevilla, November 2023

“The Paris-based ensemble of flautist Anna Besson, violonist Louis Creac’h, viola da gamba player Robin Pharo and harpsichordist Jean Rondeau brought a delicacy to early numbers by Marin Marais and Francois Couperin; a soothing ambience on a blustery Canberra night. The soft focus of the baroque flute and the intangible quality of natural strings made for a barely there, beguiling sound. And self-deprecating humour from the artists was icing on an exotic cake.”

(The West Australian, David Cusworth, October 2019)

“In Sydney on their first national tour for Musica Viva Australia, the group certainly didn’t disappoint, delivering stylish, refined performances of music by Marais, Couperin and Telemann – as well as lesser known composers Quentin and Guillemain – with easy panache and formidable technique.

The musicians whet the audience’s appetite with four movements from the fourth suite in Marin Marais’ 1692 Pièces en trio, showing off a polished, complex sound, limned at the upper end by the sweetness of Besson’s baroque flute and the darker, penetrating sound of Louis Creac’h’s violin. Lean viola da gamba lines from Robin Pharo offset rolling flourishes from Jean Rondeau in the lyrical La Marianne while the almost agonisingly drawn out Plainte once more highlighted the rich, floral sound of the ensemble.

The ornate filigree of François Couperin’s L’Espagnole suite from the 1726 Les Nations ramped up the intensity, the group’s ensemble work impeccable (and beautifully balanced) across tripping and lilting dance movements, the musicians dextrous in the fast passagework. A moment in the final Passacaille when the continuo of harpsichord and viola da gamba suddenly dropped away to reveal exquisitely duetting flute and violin was simply breath-taking.”

(Limelight Magazine, Angus McPherson, October 2019)

“Indeed, the playing throughout the disc is first-rate, and in Guillemain Nevermind pip Ensemble Barockin’ at the post”

(Gramophone, 2016)

“Nevermind, remember that name, they are an ensemble of exquisite, artistic beauty”

(Baroquiades, Jean-Stéphane Sourd Durand, April 2016)

“They are virtuosic, and not afraid to take risks in their performances”

(ABC Classic Australia)

“Thank you to Nevermind for all the emotions shared through their music with such sincerity and generosity”

(ICI Musique Canada)