The Kraken Consort

France's Kraken Consort performs Celtic pieces from Scotland and Ireland in chamber versions influenced by Baroque historical performance and other contemporary trends. The group comprises eight musicians of widely diverging backgrounds. The Kraken Consort was formed in Rennes, France, in 2021. All of its eight members had backgrounds in the Baroque historical performance movement. It was a product of the imaginations of three musicians. Bruno Helstroffer is an in-demand (and self-taught) theorbist who has also played classical and electric guitar, tenor Robert Getchell has worked with various leading French early music groups, and Chantal Santon Jeffery is a soprano with a wide operatic repertory from the Baroque and beyond who also specializes in English-language repertory. Helstroffer, Getchell, and Jeffery were joined by eclectic-minded double bassist Laurène Durantel; cittern player Ronan Pellen, who also plays cello and viola da gamba, and whose experience includes work with Irish musician Paddy Keenan as well as a variety of Baroque groups; flutist Brewen Favreau, who also plays bagpipes and has studied the Uilleann pipes in Ireland; flutist and piper Sylvain Barou, who also plays a variety of non-Western wind instruments including the Central Asian duduk, the Indian bansuri, the Armenian shvi and zurna, the Persian neyanban, and more; and violinist David Lombardi, who studied at both the Antonio Vivaldi Conservatory and the Irish World Academy of Irish Music and Dance at the University of Limerick. By 2024, the Kraken Consort was attracting bookings at major venues in France and beyond. The group's sound lay between Baroque music and traditional folk, with influences from beyond either of those. For the summer of that year, the group planned appearances at the Festival Musical de Namur in Belgium, the closing dance at the Festival des Grands Lacs du Morvan in Ouroux-en-Morvan, France, and the Festival Baroque de Tarentaise in Moutiers, France. Signed to the Alpha label, the group released its debut album, O'er the Moor: Songs and Dances from Scotland and Ireland, in 2024.
© James Manheim /TiVo