The French Renaissance music ensemble Doulce Mémoire ("Sweet Memory," also known as Ensemble Doulce Mémoire) was among the pioneers of programming that focused on music surrounding a specific historical event or setting. The group has toured unusually widely and has collaborated with a variety of musicians, including some from outside the Western tradition. Doulce Mémoire was founded in 1989 by Denis Raisin Dadre, a flutist and recorder player who studied musicology and then had a career as an orchestral player and chamber music flutist. His intent with the new group was to create a Renaissance ensemble that was diverse in instrumentation and could undertake panoramic programming that would cover various kinds of music-making that took place in (mostly) French courts of the 15th and 16th centuries. At first, the group focused on the court of King Francis I of France (r. 1515-1547). Later programs included the Renaissance "cabaret" La Dive Bouteille, music from a requiem for King Henry IV, a selection of psalms from the French Reformed Chuch, a stage presentation re-enacting the biblical story of Susanna, and a set of Carnival music from the time of Lorenzi de' Medici. Other programs showcased music that might have been heard by such figures as Leonardo da Vinci, Michelangelo, and Rabelais. Doulce Mémoire quickly attracted the attention of recording companies and released its debut album, Fricassées Lyonnaises, on the Astrée label in 1996. In the late 1990s and early 2000s, the group recorded for Astrée and for the audiophile label Dorian. Early in its career, Doulce Mémoire received an invitation to teach at the French Regional Conservatory of Tours, and it has remained associated with the historically rich Loire Valley region ever since. In 1998, Doulce Mémoire toured Eastern Europe, following that up with a tour of the U.S. the following year. The group has traveled unusually widely, appearing in South and Central America, Cuba, and Tahiti as well as more common European and North American venues. Several tours have involved collaboration with non-Western artists, including Iranian musicians, with whom group members created the ensemble Roses of Ispahan (2008), the Taiwanese company Han Tang Yuefu (2009-2010), with which they created Mémoire des Vents du Sud, and the Kudsi Ergüner Ensemble in Turkey. In 2015, Doulce Mémoire marked the 500th birthday of Francis I with an extravaganza, Magnificences à la cour de France, that mixed music, dance, and period costumes. The group moved to the Naïve label in the early 2000s and then to Zig Zag Territoires and Ricercar in the late 2000s decade; it released an album of madrigals, motets, and chansons by Jacques Arcadelt in 2018, and in 2021, it was heard on the album Royal Requiem. By that time, its recording catalog comprised more than 25 items. ~ James Manheim, Rovi

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Doulce Mémoire

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