MARTIN HELMCHEN – PIANO ORCHESTRE DE LA SUISSE ROMANDE MAREK JANOWSKI D’INDY SYMPHONIE SUR UN CHANT MONTAGNARD FRANÇAIS SAINT-SAËNS SYMPHONIE NO.2 CHAUSSON SOIR DE FÊTE HYBRID MUL TICHANNEL VINCENT D’INDY (1851-1931) “Not a single millionaire among the many hus wrote a bitter Hector Berlioz in Symphonie sur un chant montagnard français MARTIN HELMCHEN – PIANO in Paris is even thinking about doing some- 1854. About 30 years later, the music “Symphonie cévenole” Op. 25 (1886) T ORCHESTRE DE LA SUISSE ROMANDE thing for classical music. No, any composer world in France had a completely differ- (Symphony on a French Mountain Air) outside of theatrical scene attempting to ent appearance. The defeat suffered in the 1 Assez lent – Modérément animé 10. 46 MAREK JANOWSKI write a substantial work in Paris is left com- French-Prussian war in 1870 had resulted in 2 Assez modéré, mais sans lenteur 6. 33 pletely to his own resources.” an upsurge of nationalism, of which music 3 Animé 7. 32 had reaped the benefits. In the concert hall, Martin Helmchen, piano Total playing time: 62.36 Recording venue: Victoria Hall, Geneva, Switzerland, July 2010 the reign of the German composers was Executive producer: Job Maarse slowly being usurped by the French com- CAMILLE SAINT-SAËNS (1835-1921) Recording producer: Job Maarse posers. An important contributing factor Symphony No. 2 in A minor Op. 55 (1859) Balance engineer: Erdo Groot Recording engineer: Roger de Schot was the founding of the Société Nationale 4 Allegro marcato – Editing: Roger de Schot de Musique in 1871. Proudly announcing its Allegro appassionato 7. 24 Design: Netherlads slogan ‘Ars Gallica’, this institute stimulated 5 Adagio 3. 14 the composition and performance of French 6 Scherzo – Presto 4. 58 (instrumental) music. The Société brought 7 Prestissimo 7. 09 about the first performances of new com- positions by Chabrier, Debussy, Dukas, ERNEST CHAUSSON (1855-1899) Biographien auf Deutsch und Französisch finden Sie auf unserer Webseite. Ravel, Fauré, Franck and Lalo, to mention 8 Soir de fête 14. 42 Pour les versions allemande et française des biographies, but a few. Furthermore, composers such as Symphonic poem Op. 32 (1897-1898) veuillez consulter notre site. www.pentatonemusic.com Jules Pasdeloup, Edouard Colonne (Concerts Colonne) and Charles Lamoureux (Concerts Lamoureux) placed a major role. Polyhymnia specialises in high-end recordings of acoustic music on location in concert halls, churches, and audito- riums around the world. It is one of the worldwide leaders in producing high-resolution surround sound recordings Vincent d’Indy was one of the com- for SA-CD and DVD-Audio. Polyhymnia’s engineers have years of experience recording the world’s top classical posers who was urged by, among others, artists, and are experts in working with these artists to achieve an audiophile sound and a perfect musical balance. Camille Saint-Saëns – with whom he was Most of Polyhymnia’s recording equipment is built or substantially modified in-house. Particular emphasis is often engaged in a polemic – to carry out placed on the quality of the analogue signal path. For this reason, most of the electronics in the recording chain research into the musical inheritance of are designed and built in-house, including the microphone preamplifiers and the internal electronics of the micro- phones. France. He became a member of the Société Polyhymnia International was founded in 1998 as a management buy-out by key personnel of the former Philips Nationale the Musique from the very start. Classics Recording Center. Subsequently, he came into contact with For more info: www.polyhymnia.nl German music, thanks to his teacher César d’Indy also uses the cyclic principle. This orchestra. Not surprisingly, he soon acquired Halévy. In 1856, he entered his Symphony Franck. He fell completely under the spell technique – also learned from Franck – great standing as a pianist, teacher and com- in F (Urbs Roma) in a composition competi- of Richard Wagner’s music, which resulted bases all the movements of a composition poser. Furthermore, his role as co-founder tion organized by the Société Sainte-Cécile in the opera Fervaal; a work that is often on the same thematic material. Of course, of the above-mentioned Société Nationale in Bordeaux: however, although he won first referred to as the “French Parsifal”. But he Franck did not invent this technology: rather, de Musique and his commitment to the prize in the competition, he withdrew the was also interested in French folk music, and he distilled it from compositions written by music of younger French colleagues was work after its performance. in 1886 he began to collect folk melodies Beethoven, among others. Perhaps this of great significance. But he was not exclu- Saint-Saëns had already written his from the Ardèche, on which he subse- explains why d’Indy began his Symphonie sively interested in contemporary music: first numbered symphony three years pre- quently based a number of compositions. sur un chant Montagnard français with a for instance, he also published an edition of viously, in 1853. This composition showed For instance, his Symphonie cévenole – bet- quote from the first bar of Beethoven’s works by Jean Philippe Rameau (a ‘hobby’ such exceptional maturity and possessed ter known as the Symphonie sur un chant Hammerklavier Sonata, transposed into which he happened to share with d’Indy, such a unique sound, that upon first hear- montagnard français – is based on a folk major. who later published editions of works by ing the work, it never even occurred to song from the Cévennes mountain range. The name Camille Saint-Saëns has Rameau, Gluck and Monteverdi). Berlioz and Gounod – who had no idea at Although d’Indy deliberately named the already been mentioned. How could it not Therefore, it is all the more amazing the time who had written it – that the tal- work a “symphony”, it is actually a synthesis be? Saint-Saëns was undoubtedly one of that nowadays only a handful of works by ented young student was the composer. He of piano concerto and symphony. Despite the most influential figures in the French this all-rounder – who in his own words wrote his Symphony No. 2 in 1859, and here the piano part being written in a virtuoso musical world during the second half of the produced compositions “the same way we hear a truly mature composer at work. style, it is nevertheless entirely embedded nineteenth century. He was a child prodigy: an apple tree produces apples” – are to Yet the work is still imbued with the spirit of in the symphonic structure. During the at the age of two, he was already reading be seen with any regularity on the music Beethoven and Mendelssohn. Beethoven is same period, various other French compos- music; and just a year later, he started to stands. As far as symphonies are concerned, present in the dominance of the form – not ers were also experimenting with hybrid write his first short musical pieces. His other it is almost exclusively his Symphony No. 3 without reason was Saint-Saëns known as forms, of which the best-known example studies included Latin, astronomy, astrol- (Organ Symphony) dating from 1886 that is the French Classicist ‘par excellence’ – and is undoubtedly César Franck’s Variations ogy, geometry and archaeology. While still performed. Most music fans probably do the light touch of the Finale is reminiscent symphoniques. a child, he would climb down into the quarry not even know that Saint-Saëns composed of Mendelssohn. After a dramatic slow D’Indy clearly idolized César Franck, as in Meudon, chisel in hand, to chip out fos- as many as five symphonies, of which only introduction, the entire first movement is is proven by the reverential biography he sils for his collection; and later on, he used three are numbered. He wrote his first sym- dominated by the first fugue theme, which wrote in 1906. Many works by d’Indy also the money he had earned with a series of phony, in A major, as early as 1850: it forms is written in 6/8 time. The slow movement contain Franck’s “germ-cell” technique, in compositions for the harmonium to buy a part of a group of works written by the could have served as a model for the slow which the composer developed the musi- telescope. And then, of course, there’s the 15-year-old boy between his enrolment at movement of the Symphony by César cal material from small motivic cells. In his music. Saint-Saëns was only 10 years old the Paris Conservatoire and the actual start Franck. The Scherzo merges into a trio, Symphonie sur un chant français Montagnard, when he first appeared as piano soloist with of his composition lessons with Fromental after which, surprisingly, the Scherzo is not repeated: according to the traditional the- several trips to Germany to attend perfor- tral colours. The mainstay of the work is matic fantasy, as no programme is involved: ory of musical form, this should have been mances of the composer’s music dramas based on original ideas for the orchestra- rather, it is a kind of character sketch.” the case. The Finale is formed by a whirling – left an indelible stamp on his style, in par- tion as well as surprising twists and turns tarantella. ticular on his opera Le Roi Arthus (1886-1895). in the harmony, more indicative of Debussy Ronald Vermeulen Like Saint-Saëns, Ernest Chausson was In 1886, Chausson was appointed sec- than of Franck. Paul Dukas characterized English translation: Fiona J. Stroker-Gale also introduced at a young age into the main retary of the Société Nationale de Musique; this music aptly as “not a purely musical cultural circles in Paris.