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National Radio Symphony Orchestra received acclaimed notices worldwide, while The Gramophone, Fanfare, Classics Igor Today and Penguin Guide to Compact Discs have all recognised his work, the last with numerous Rosettes and a Key Recordings listing. Australian critics’ organizations named him Artist of the Year and Best Opera Conductor, the latter for his conducting of the world première of Larry Sitsky’s The Golem at Sydney Opera House. Also a widely performed MARKEVITCH composer, Lyndon-Gee was awarded a prestigious composition prize by the Onassis Foundation, Athens, in 2001. He has won the Adolf Spivakovsky Prize, the Sounds Australian Award (three times), and two MacDowell Fellowships. He is currently working on major orchestral works including The Auschwitz Poems, Socrates’ Death (intended for performance at Canterbury Cathedral, in his native England), and a second commission for the German conductor Eckart Schloifer, … Complete Orchestral Works • 1 und unter den Blättern saß Er, weinend. During 2003 his setting of an ancient Greek Ode under the title The Temple of Athena Pronaea had its première in New York. In the same week, On the Theory of Cosmic Strings received its première by Peter Sheppard Skærved at the Odense Festival, Denmark, and has since been performed over fifty times. Frammento Partita • Le Paradis Perdu (Oratorio) del Dante, a setting of lines from the Paradiso, was commissioned by the Echo Klassiek Preis-winning German ensemble SingerPur, and had its première in Florence in 2006. Lyndon-Gee is now working on a further work for SingerPur, Lieder des Morgensterns. In 2004 he co-ordinated eight composers (including himself) to set the work of the American poet Soloists • Netherlands Concert Choir laureate William Meredith in honour of Meredith’s 85th birthday, for a “Songbook” recital that toured worldwide in more than 22 performances. A 25th Anniversary Presteigne Festival Commission, Over Litton, after a poem of Edward Storey, had its première in 2007. Lyndon-Gee studied under Arthur Hutchings and Rudolf Schwartz in Great Britain, Franco Arnhem Philharmonic Orchestra • Lyndon-Gee Ferrara and Goffredo Petrassi in Italy, and Igor Markevitch at Monte Carlo. Hearing him conduct a student concert in Rome, Leonard Bernstein invited him to Tanglewood, where he met Bruno Maderna, becoming the latter’s assistant in Milan. Erich Leinsdorf and Maurice Abravanel were also influential on his work. He enjoyed a busy early career as pianist, specialising in contemporary repertoire; over 200 new works were written for him, by composers such as Oliver Knussen, Jonathan Lloyd, Nicola LeFanu, David Bedford, Mauro Cardi, Ada Gentile, Silvano Bussotti and many more. Since 2005, he has conducted regularly at the prestigious Warsaw Autumn Festival; at the 2007 Jubilee Fiftieth Anniversary Festival, he conducted four world premières by distinguished Polish, Lithuanian and Slovakian composers; in late 2006 he led the closing concert of the eight-day Festival entirely devoted to the works of leading Polish composer Paweł Szymański. As Music Director of the Adelphi Symphony based on Long Island, New York, he has gathered an orchestra of predominantly Russian and Ukrainian expatriate musicians, in programmes featuring music of Peteris Vasks, Louis Andriessen, Alfred Schnittke, Joanne Metcalf, Sidney Boquiren, Arvo Pärt and rare American performances of works such as Shostakovich’s Symphony No. 13 ‘Babi Yar’, Messiaen’s Trois Petites Liturgies, Monteverdi’s Vespers of the Blessed Virgin, as well as many new works. He serves also as Chair of the Music Department at New York’s Adelphi University. His hectic freelance career includes regular visits to orchestras in Germany, Poland, Italy, England, The Netherlands, Australia, New Zealand, Sweden, Russia and several other countries.

Partita recorded at the Musis Sacrum, Arnhem, The Netherlands, on 20th and 21st June, 1997 Le Paradis Perdu recorded at live performances at the Musis Sacrum, Arnhem, on 10th March, 1999, and at the Concertzaal de Vereeniging, Nijmegen, The Netherlands, on 11th March, 1999, Studio corrections were made at the Concertzaal de Vereeniging, Nijmegen, on 12th March, 1999 Producer and editor: Benno Torrenga • Engineer: Henk Midderham Publisher: Boosey & Hawkes Music Publishers, Inc.

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Igor Markevitch (1912-1983) Christopher Lyndon-Gee (Markevitch Cantate and Le Paradis Perdu, both recorded for Marco Polo, as well as Complete Orchestral Works • 1 Prokofiev Alexander Nevsky); the Royal Flanders Philharmonic Orchestra under Yutaka Sado and Jan Caeyers; the Limburg Symphony Orchestra under Jurjen Hempel (Peter Maxwell Davies’ Job); the Netherlands Radio This first volume of the complete orchestral works of the reasons for his abandoning composition; and his Symphony Orchestra under Nikolai Alekseyev, Giuliano Carella and Eri Klas (Tchaikovsky’s Evgeni Onegin); the Igor Markevitch1 features his most ambitious large-scale autobiography Être et avoir été, published in 1980, Rotterdam Philharmonic Orchestra under Edo de Waart (Berlioz L’Enfance du Christ and Beethoven Mass in C) composition, the oratorio Le Paradis Perdu. obfuscates and misleads even as it makes a show of and Valery Gergiev (Berlioz Requiem); and the BBC Concert Orchestra under Barry Wordsworth in the opening Markevitch’s arrestingly original orchestral music led to revealing the writer’s inner life. concert, entitled ‘Highlights of the Proms’, of the Amsterdam Concertgebouw’s British Season 2003. Also in 2003, his being hailed in the 1930s as one of the singular voices Markevitch is dissimilar to the “conductor- the choir toured with the Spanish flamenco guitarist Paco Peña and his Flamenco Company to Lebanon and Greece of his time, yet he was subsequently ignored - not least by composer” model exemplified by Furtwängler, with his Misa Flamenca. himself in later life. Apart from a handful of radio Klemperer, Weingartner and many others between the broadcasts and one work preserved on 78rpm discs, this wars. Contrary to them, he emerged first as a Rob Vermeulen series constitutes the first recordings ever made of these phenomenally gifted adolescent composer exalted by his remarkable works. Thus, these discs may offer the contemporaries on the basis of an astoundingly assured Rob Vermeulen was born in 1961 and studied at the Arnhem and Rotterdam Schools of Music where he received his beginnings of an opportunity to decipher the mystery that series of early scores, turning to conducting almost Choral Directing Diploma and School Music Diploma. He attended master-classes in choral and orchestral directing is Igor Markevitch. reluctantly when required by his own work and by the led by, amongst others, Laszlo Heltay, Sir John Eliot Gardiner and Uwe Gronostay and also took part in the Kirill The sole precedent of Rossini - who retired from the hardships of post-war life. Yet, after changing course to Kondrashin master-class for orchestral conductors. Rob Vermeulen has been the artistic director and choirmaster of composition of opera at the age of 38 to become a this new career exclusively as a conductor at thirty, he all the Netherlands Concert Choir since 1993. He lectures in choral conducting at the Arnhem Conservatoire and is restaurateur, but continued to write salon music and but denied the existence of his own music until nearly senior lecturer in choral conducting at the Utrecht Conservatoire. In addition, Vermeulen is conductor and artistic sacred works - seems hardly comparable. Markevitch’s seventy years old. When questioned in 1958 about his director of a number of chamber choirs. Since 1990, he has also been the conductor of the Utrecht Project Choir, renunciation at 29 of his identity as a composer is a early life as composer, he replied diffidently: which specializes in performing contemporary choral music. unique case in the history of music. To quote David “I would say to you, very frankly, that I am objective Drew, “It is a silence like no other in the music of this enough to claim that there is music which needs to be Het Gelders Orkest (Arnhem Philharmonic Orchestra) century or before”. heard before mine, and for which the need is more urgent. At first glance, the eclipse during his lifetime of Apart from that, if my works are good enough, they can Based in Arnhem, the Arnhem Philharmonic Orchestra gives some hundred symphony concerts each season in the Markevitch’s reputation as a composer appears due, more wait; and if they cannot wait, it is pointless to play them”. province of Gelderland, in Amsterdam, Rotterdam and Utrecht, and abroad, including tours to Spain, Austria, than any other single factor, to the dimensions of his The facts of his ‘first life’ are remarkable enough. Germany and Hungary. In 2007 the orchestra toured Japan for the first time and returns there in 2009. From the success as a conductor. Born in Ki’ev on 27th July, 1912, he moved to Paris with 2003-2004 season Martin Sieghart took over as Chief Conductor and artistic adviser of the orchestra. Ken-ichro What has yet to be fully explained, however, is why his family in 1914 before settling in Switzerland. As early Kobayashi was appointed Permanent Conductor from the 2006-2007 season, and Nikolai Alexeev Permanent Guest his life divides so dramatically and uncompromisingly as the age of thirteen, he played his piano suite Noces to Conductor in 2002. Former Chief Conductors include Lawrence Renes, Roberto Benzi and Yoav Talmi. Other into two halves - clearly a conscious decision on his part, Alfred Cortot, who recommended the work to his conductors who have regularly made guest appearances with the orchestra in the past years include Bernard Klee, and one whose true reasons this intensely private man publishers and invited the boy to study with him. Hans Vonk, Jaap van Zweden and Roy Goodman. Soloists such as Jean-Yves Thibaudet, Leif Ove Andsnes, Zoltan seems to have sought to keep hidden. Markevitch’s last In January 1929, before his seventeenth birthday, he Koscis, Nicolai Znaider and Akiko Suwanai are also among those who have performed with the orchestra. original composition was written in 1941 at the age of 29, enraptured Dyagilev with his Sinfonietta in F, leading in Recordings by the Arnhem Philharmonic Orchestra include the symphonies of Schubert, Tchaikovsky, Brahms and and he never again returned to the creative endeavours a matter of months to the young composer’s completing Berlioz, with an enthusiastic reception by the press in both Japan and The Netherlands for recordings of Mahler’s that had brought him such renown and adulation when and playing his new Piano Concerto at Covent Garden Sixth Symphony and Das Lied von der Erde. barely in his twenties. (in concert form between L’après-midi d’un faune and The trauma of the Second World War marks a sharp Renard, at what the influential social columns of Christopher Lyndon-Gee dividing line during which the composer appears to have London’s Sketch referred to as a “rehearsal party” for a undergone a mental, as well as physical crisis - for in select group of intelligentsia including, apparently, Christopher Lyndon-Gee was nominated for Grammys in 1998 for Best Orchestral Performance for the groundbreaking 1942 Markevitch suffered a serious illness while living in Virginia Woolf). Soon after, he commenced work on a complete works of Igor Markevitch (Marco Polo), in 2003 for the world première recording of George Rochberg’s Tuscany, and in a letter of the same year written during major ballet score, L’Habit du Roi (The Emperor’s New Symphony No. 5 on Naxos American Classics, and again in 2007 for Hans Werner Henze’s Violin Concertos Nos. 1 & 3, his recuperation, he declared that he sensed himself “dead Clothes), to be choreographed by Lifar with décor by with Peter Sheppard Skærved. In 2001-2002 recordings for Naxos of Arcana and other works by Varèse, with the Polish between two lives”. But this alone cannot fully explain Picasso. 8.570773 215 8.570773 570773 bk Markevitch 15/7/08 19:35 Page 14

Rozdestvensky and Haitink. She was a memorable Britannia at the Last Night of the Proms in the Royal Albert Hall, In short, he was at seventeen launched by Dyagilev any of his desires. London, and took part in the performance of Beethoven’s Ninth Symphony, conducted by the late Leonard Bernstein on a path that brought worldwide fame as a composer by It is undoubtedly more than coincidental that at in Berlin, given to celebrate the opening of the Berlin Wall at Christmas in 1989. With Christopher Lyndon-Gee and the time he was twenty. nineteen Markevitch should have turned to the Icarus the Arnhem Philharmonic she sang Prokofiev’s Alexander Nevsky on the same programme as Le Paradis Perdu. “I was his last discovery” were Markevitch’s words myth for his first truly individual work, L’Envol d’Icare, Sarah Walker, however, has perhaps achieved her greatest critical acclaim on the recital platform for her in a revealing 1972 interview with the New York dance a score which he continued to re-work in various forms interpretation of the Lied, Mélodie and Song repertoire. The overwhelming success of her Wigmore Hall début critic John Gruen; and indeed, the manner in which for more than a decade. Icarus, who flew too close to the established her as a recitalist of supreme excellence and this is reflected in more than fifty recordings, evidence of Dyagilev, “the greatest agent-provocateur that ever sun and fell to earth, embodies a vivid image of the fate her wide repertoire and artistry. Sarah Walker was made a Companion of the British Empire in the 1991 Queen’s existed”, took him up must at least in part have been a of the young composer, swept along by the frenetic Birthday Honours. www.sarahwalker.com journey into nostalgia for the impresario. Paris of the nineteen-thirties. Indeed, the most striking Markevitch could hardly have entered more fully passage of Icare is the lengthy, hypnotic, ecstatic- Jon Garrison into the world of the Ballets-Russes, as he went on to obsessive “Death” that concludes the work, occupying marry Nijinsky’s daughter Kyra, though this marriage nearly one-third of its duration. The gifted American tenor, Jon Garrison, is a favourite of many of the world’s distinguished conductors. At the soon degenerated. So much so that during their wartime The series of large-scale works that followed over Metropolitan Opera he was Cassio in Otello, Tamino in Die Zauberflöte, Romeo in Roméo et Juliette, von life in Italy, Bernard Berenson rather amusingly related the following brief eight years is a succession of Eisenstein in Strauss’ Die Fledermaus, and Ottavio in Don Giovanni. His European engagements have included the that Igor and Kyra used to visit him alternately, since masterpieces in constantly changing languages. Rébus title rôle in Idomeneo with the Garsington Opera in Surrey; Adolar in Weber’s Euryanthe with the Orchestra of the “when they were together their artistic temperaments and Le Nouvel Âge both embody a Prokofiev-like Enlightenment in London; and with the BBC Symphony, Birtwistle’s Mask of Orpheus and Stravinsky’s Oedipus tended to explode”. They were estranged four years into grittiness married to that motoric ‘moto perpetuo’ quality Rex, which he also performed with von Dohnányi and the Cleveland Orchestra. He was in Lobgesang with the this nine-year marriage, and Markevitch soon married that so typifies the music of Albert Roussel, but in a Gulbenkian Orchestra in Lisbon, and Scottish Opera engaged him for two seasons as Pedro in Ines de Castro. Other again, though not before he and Kyra had had a son, more pointed harmonic framework, and continuing the appearances include the rôles of Jean le Jongleur in Massenet’s Le Jongleur de Notre Dame with Central City nicknamed “Funtyki”, or “small pound weight” by exploration of multiple simultaneous polyrhythms that Opera, Sam in Susannah with Hawaii Opera and Cedar Rapids Opera, Eisenstein in Die Fledermaus with Fresno Berenson, named Vaslav in honor of his grandfather. are Markevitch’s trademark. The all-too-brief Cantique Grand Opera, Bajazet in Handel’s Tamerlano at the Spoleto Festival USA. Jon Garrison sang in the world premières The music of this extraordinary young man betrays d’Amour is a ravishing Skryabinesque essay in evocative of Stewart Copeland’s Holy Blood, Crescent Moon (Cleveland Opera), Jay Reise’s Rasputin (New York City no hint of immaturity: both in style and technique it is color, yet curiously emotionally detached. Psaume and Opera), and Hugo Weisgall’s The Gardens of Adonis (Opera Omaha). He participated in a tribute to Gian Carlo complete, utterly assured and deeply original. His the cantata-symphony Lorenzo il Magnifico are massive Menotti with the Little Orchestra Society at Lincoln Center and appeared in Claude Baker’s Into the Sun with Cantate of 1930, written on a text of Cocteau (and and bold. The early works Sinfonietta, Concerto Grosso Leonard Slatkin and the National Symphony. On the occasion of the farewell performances of Zubin Mehta’s tenure including music rescued from the sketches for L’Habit and Partita are memorable for far more than merely their with the New York Philharmonic, he sang and recorded Schönberg’s Gurre-Lieder. For EMI he recorded du Roi), brought forth the comment from Henri Sauget youthful assurance of execution; their harmonic Szymanowski’s Symphony No. 3 under the baton of Simon Rattle and the Evangelist in Bach’s St Matthew Passion “…it bears witness to a very fine mastery, and to a language explores beyond the conventional, and their with Raymond Leppard conducting. Other recordings include The Rake’s Progress and Oedipus Rex on the marvelous balance of intelligence and esprit”. polytonal and rhythmic ideas are searchingly original. MusicMasters label, and Handel’s Roman Vespers for RCA. This eighteen-year-old, indeed, was hailed L’Envol d’Icare remains the singular work among throughout Europe as perhaps the brightest hope in the these masterpieces, whether for its ascetic, pointillistic Nederlands Concertkoor (Netherlands Concert Choir) musical firmament of that time. Only three years later scoring; its visionary use of quarter-tone tuning, Darius Milhaud wrote of the première of L’Envol harmonically so precisely calculated; its brilliant The Nederlands Concertkoor, formed at the initiative of Bernard Haitink in 1987, is the country’s leading amateur d’Icare: “this work …will probably mark a date in the exploitation of complex rhythmic simultaneities; or the choir and consists of some 100 trained singers, carefully selected for their vocal and musical qualities. The choir is evolution of music”. sheer unique sound-world that it evokes from the independent and performs with many orchestras, conductors and soloists from The Netherlands and abroad. Since Was this adulation more than the young composer orchestra. Above all, for the poise and emotional charge 1993, the choir has been under the artistic directorship of choirmaster Rob Vermeulen. Under his leadership, the could bear? Had Dyagilev put pressure on him, of its hypnotic “Death”. Nederlands Concertkoor has been much in demand for performances of 18th, 19th and 20th century choral music conscious or unconscious, to be the new Stravinsky, The achievement of Igor Markevitch bridges and collaborates on five to seven major choral productions per year. In recent years the Nederlands Concertkoor has exactly thirty years on? His autobiography reveals a important gaps in our understanding of the period worked with, amongst others, the Residentie Orchestra of The Hague under Jaap van Zweden (Beethoven Ninth sense that the overnight glory which assailed him as between the wars. His language is aggressively Symphony) and Matthias Bamert (Verhulst Mass in C, recorded for Chandos and released in 2003); the Netherlands Dyagilev’s protégé caused such a break with the normal individual. Not neo-classical, it has classical restraint Philharmonic Orchestra under Gerd Albrecht (Dvoﬁák’s Requiem); the Arnhem Philharmonic Orchestra under rhythms of adolescence that he felt a stranger had been and a poise that is almost frigidly disciplined. In an born within, an alien persona that guided him beyond æsthetic distant from the transmuted romanticism that 8.570773 14 3 8.570773 570773 bk Markevitch 15/7/08 19:35 Page 4

propels the music of Berg and Schoenberg, he initiated 1926-28 Lucy Shelton an exploration of dissonance (through polytonality) that Studies piano with Cortot, and harmony and from today’s perspective we can readily identify as a counterpoint with Nadia Boulanger at the École The only artist to receive the International Walter W. Naumburg Award twice, as a soloist and as a chamber fertile harmonic path. Dissatisfied with what he seems Normale de Musique in Paris. musician, soprano Lucy Shelton has performed repertoire from Bach to Boulez in major recital, chamber and to have perceived as the indulgent prettiness of orchestral venues throughout the world. Highly acclaimed as an interpreter of new music, she continues to bring impressionism, he sought a purity and detachment of 1929 new audiences into the sound world of new works, often composed for her. Notable among numerous world style that were rare in this interbellum period of excess. Markevitch completes his diplomas at the École premières are Elliott Carter’s Of Challenge and Of Love and his Tempo e Tempi, Oliver Knussen’s Whitman Igor Markevitch has so recently begun to emerge Normale, commencing his Sinfonietta for Orchestra as Settings, Stephen Albert’s Flower of the Mountain, Joseph Schwantner’s Sparrows and his Two Poems of Agueda from the shadows in his “first incarnation” as a part of his qualifying work. Now sixteen, he plays the Pizarro and Magabunda, Alexander Goehr’s Sing, Ariel and The Mouse Metamorphosed Into a Maid, David Del composer that an outline of the major events of this Sinfonietta and Noces to Dyagilev, who soon after Tredici’s Quaint Events, Poul Ruder’s The Bells, Gérard Grisey’s L’Icone Paradoxiale, Ned Rorem’s Schuyller early phase of his life will be illuminating; not least, commissions two new works from him: a Piano Songs, Sally Beamish’s Monster, James Yannatos’s Trinity Mass, Lewis Spratlan’s Of Time and the Seasons, and because it shows him in constant, intimate contact with Concerto, which receives a concert première Rob Zuidam’s Johanna’s Lament. Since her return to the United States from England in 1997 she has had five innumerable other, and hitherto better-known, major sandwiched between ballets at the Covent Garden recordings released on Deutsche Grammophon and Koch International with repertoire by Carter, Stravinsky, figures of the century. season of the Ballets Russes in July (with Markevitch Crawford Seeger and Messiaen. Five additional CDs include works by Del Tredici, Rands, Adolphe, Kim, and himself as soloist); and L’Habit du Roi (The Emperor’s Carter. She also has recordings on Bridge Records, Unicorn-Kanchana and Virgin Classics with music of Goehr, Chronology New Clothes), a ballet with scenario by Boris Kochno Knussen and Schoenberg. Shelton made her BBC Proms début in Dallapiccola’s Il Prigioniero and her Vienna and and designs by Picasso. Berlin débuts singing Kurtag’s The Sayings of Peter Bornemissza with Andras Schiff. Among notable conductors 1912 Only briefly before Dyagilev’s death on August with whom Shelton has worked are Barenboim, Boulez, De Leeuw, Knussen, Lyndon-Gee, Metzmacher, Nott, Born in Ki’ev, 27th July, to the pianist Boris Markevitch 19th, Markevitch accompanies him to Baden-Baden for Eötvös, Rattle, Rilling, Rostropovich, Salonen, Slatkin, and Wolff. A native Californian, she began her musical (a student of Eugene d’Albert) and to Zola Pokitonova. the world première of Hindemith and Brecht’s training early with the study of both piano and flute. After graduating from Pomona College she pursued singing at Lehrstück; and to Munich for performances of Tristan the New England Conservatory and at the Aspen Music School where she studied with Jan de Gaetani. She has 1914 und Isolde and Die Zauberflöte conducted by Richard taught at the Cleveland Institute of Music, the New England Conservatory and the Eastman School. She is currently The Markevitch family flees Russia for Paris. Strauss. With Dyagilev dead, L’Habit du Roi is on the faculty of the Tanglewood Music Center and coaches privately at her studio in New York City. Markevitch grows up speaking primarily French, and abandoned, but some of its music is incorporated into will eventually write his autobiography Être et avoir été Cantate with a new text specially written by Jean Sarah Walker in French in 1980. Cocteau. Sarah Walker C.B.E., F.R.C.M., F.G.S.M. is an artist of international standing both on the opera stage and on the 1916 1930 concert platform world-wide. Having initially studied violin at the Royal College of Music, London, she The family settles in La-Tour-de-Peilz (Vevey), Roger Désormière (who conducted for Markevitch in subsequently began taking vocal lessons with the celebrated Hungarian teacher, Madame Vera Rozsa, with whom Switzerland. his Piano Concerto the previous year) presents the she built an extraordinarily wide repertoire ranging from Bach and the Baroque to twentieth-century composers, enormously successful première of Cantate in Paris on such as Berio, Boulez, Cage, Henze, Ligeti, Copland and Ives, and is now commissioning new works from exciting, 1921-23 June 4th. young, 21st century composers. Since her début at Glyndebourne, as Diana/Giove in Cavalli’s La Calisto, she has Igor studies piano with his father until the latter’s death In August, the publishing house of Schott (Mainz) sung in opera houses all over the world including The Royal Opera House Covent Garden - where she made her in 1923. accepts the Sinfonietta, the Piano Concerto and Cantate début as Charlotte in Massenet’s Werther opposite Alfredo Kraus; The Metropolitan Opera New York, where she for publication. made her début as Micah in Handel’s Samson with Jon Vickers in the title rôle; the Vienna Staatsoper, Le Châtelet 1925 December 8th: world première in Paris of Concerto in Paris, Geneva, Brussels, Hamburg, Munich, Chicago, San Francisco, Lisbon, Madrid and many others. Among The thirteen-year-old Igor plays his piano suite Noces Grosso, reviewed as follows by no less than Darius more than sixty rôles in her repertoire are Didon, Maria Stuarda, Fricka, Klytämnestra, Dorabella, Donna Elvira, (Nuptials) to Alfred Cortot (himself a composer). Cortot Milhaud in L’Europe of 13th December: Katisha, Mistress Quickly, numerous Handel and Monteverdi heroines and the title rôle in Britten’s Gloriana, arranges for its publication, and invites Markevitch to “Markévitch’s Concerto Grosso was one of those recorded as a video for Virgin Classics. Recent highlights included Pavarotti’s sixtieth birthday performances of study with him. great rendings of the musical skies, a door suddenly Donizetti’s La Fille du régiment at the Met, Peter Grimes at La Scala and The Witch in Hänsel und Gretel for opening on the future which allows an as yet unknown L’Accademia Nazionale di Santa Cecilia in Rome. On the concert platform Sarah Walker has worked with climate to enter. Igor Markévitch has a formidable conductors such as Solti, Kleiber, Norrington, Masur, Rattle, Eliot Gardiner, Muti, Harnoncourt, Mackerras, technique and a truly unique invention”. 8.570773 4 13 8.570773 570773 bk Markevitch 15/7/08 19:35 Page 12

Milton focuses his account on the dismay in heaven. VIII, which so memorably speak of the “wandering 1931 with Hermann Scherchen in Switzerland; Scherchen (PL lines 229 - 231 ff. / Book X). Fires” that are the planets, the “attendant moons” of Composes the Sérénade (January - March), perhaps his becomes one of the principal advocates of his music. The one authentic depiction is perhaps that of Jupiter observed by Galileo years earlier, and which most “Stravinskian” work, for the newly-formed Satan’s degradation, stung by failure into planning his subtly supports the Copernican view of the solar system. Parisian ensemble ‘Sérénade’. 1935 own descent into pure, ever more “subtle” evil. He How telling is Milton’s reference to “ … a spot like On 24th April, Hans Rosbaud conducts the German Substituting for Scherchen, Markevitch conducts the world progresses from the state of a fallen angel into that of which perhaps / Astronomer in the sun’s lucent orb / premières of Concerto Grosso and Piano Concerto with première of his oratorio Le Paradis Perdu (Paradise Lost) the agent of the world’s despair. Perhaps his truest lines Through his glazed optick tube yet never saw,” thus to the orchestra of Frankfurt Radio (the latter work with at Queen’s Hall, London, on December 20th. in Markevitch’s version are: unforgettable sharing of wisdom in the company of the the composer as soloist). great scientist thirty years before. None of this here, but, The world première of Rébus in Paris on December 1936 “Encourageant la guerre instead … a remarkable musical edifice that in its 15th is hailed as a major triumph for the composer. Marries Kyra, daughter of Vaslav Nijinsky, in April. Et faussant le progrès energy and superb, often terrifying momentum does Writing in The New York Times for 10th January, 1932, They decide to live in Corsier, Switzerland. Je nourris la Mort portray a compelling view of the cosmic, elemental Henri Prunières declares: des fruits amers du vice”. drama of existence. “I am in no particular hurry to proclaim the genius 1937 of even the most gifted musicians. But in the case of Conducts L’Envol d’Icare at the Venice Biennale in “Encouraging war © 2008 Christopher Lyndon-Gee Markevitch, after the new work he has just given us, September, remarking to fellow-composer Alex de and placing obstacles in the way of progress doubt is no longer permissible … his music is not Graeff: “I rejoice to hear it again, but I am nervous to I nourish Death 1 This is the first volume of the Naxos Igor Markevitch young. He is a little like Menuhin, who, when he was conduct it for the first time . . . it is so terribly difficult”. by the bitter fruits of vice”. Complete Orchestral Works Edition, to be followed by the 10, played like a master and not like a child prodigy”. Stravinsky (whose Jeu de cartes is on the same seven volumes previously released on Marco Polo. Hailed by many as the “second Igor”, Markevitch is programme) is in the audience, and retreats from his Milton, let it never be forgotten, stayed as Galileo’s now persona non grata with Stravinsky. earlier hostility to Markevitch, expressing admiration guest at Fiesole - not a mile from Berenson’s home at Extracts from the sung texts © copyright 1977 by Boosey & for the score. Settignano - in 1638-39, and some of what he learned Hawkes Music Publishers Ltd. Reproduced by permission. 1933 made its way into his poem, especially in Books V and After being asked by Mengelberg to conduct the Dutch 1938 première of Rébus with the Concertgebouw Orchestra in Contriving a commission fee as a New Year’s Day gift, February, Markevitch takes conducting lessons from Piatigorsky requests a cello concerto. Pierre Monteux (who directs the remainder of this The world première in Warsaw on 21st January of Martijn van den Hoek concert). At this stage, he sees conducting as a task Le Nouvel Âge marks a new triumph for the composer. purely in relation to his own music. The American On his way back from Poland, Markevitch visits Martijn van den Hoek is one of the most widely recognised contemporary Dutch pianists, specially noted for his première of Rébus follows in April, given by Serge Nijinsky for the first time in the sanatorium at originality in programming, pioneering repertoire choices and close associations with many living composers. Born Koussevitzky and the Boston Symphony. Kreuzlingen; Kyra describes this meeting, and its effect in Rotterdam, Martijn van den Hoek won the Franz Liszt piano competition in Utrecht, The Netherlands in 1986, On June 26th, Désormière conducts the tumultuous on her father, as “a marvel”. Performed at the Palais des aged 22, propelling him rapidly to a distinguished career. His performance of Liszt’s Totentanz at that competition is première in Paris of L’Envol d’Icare (The Flight of Beaux-Arts in Brussels in April, Le Nouvel Âge is still vividly remembered and often played again on Dutch radio. His interest in Liszt continues to be illuminated by Icarus), declared by Milhaud to be “a date in the acclaimed by an audience of two thousand. In response his pioneering sponsorship of the restoration of Erard pianos, upon which Liszt himself played, and by his revelatory evolution of music”. Le Corbusier and Cocteau, as well to this performance, Léon Kochnitsky writes in the May performances on these instruments, with their unique stringing and overtone structure that are essential to a true as many musicians of importance are among the issue of La Revue Musicale: appreciation of Liszt’s harmonic language. Professor of Piano at the Vienna Conservatoire, Martijn van den Hoek is audience. “It is often said that a gulf exists between founding Artistic Director of the Muzik Zentral summer music academy and festival at Bad Aussee, upper Austria, in contemporary composers and the masses who are avid the shadow of the lake where Brahms wrote many of his greatest works. Noteworthy among recent festivals was the 1934 for music. For Markévitch this gulf does not exist; in open-air morning performance organised by Martijn van den Hoek at the Dachstein Glacier in August 1999 Psaume is greeted by a riot at its Italian première in that lies true genius”. simultaneously with the full eclipse of the sun; Liszt’s Mountain Symphony and Markevitch’s L’Envol d’Icare were Florence. In June, Markevitch begins a collaboration with performed, with a one-hour intermission during the eclipse itself. Today, Martijn van den Hoek maintains homes in Stravinsky’s one-time librettist C.-F. Ramuz on La Japan and Europe as springboards for his busy and influential career. 1934-36 Taille de l’Homme, a ‘concert’ for soprano and Markevitch undertakes occasional conducting study ensemble designed to last an entire evening. Due to 8.570773 12 5 8.570773 570773 bk Markevitch 15/7/08 19:35 Page 6

worsening conditions in Europe, and the end of his recomposes L’Envol d’Icare as Icare, abandoning the the composer presages it in the insistent, worrying “... Infinite in pardon was my Judge, publishing contract in Germany, he supplements his quarter-tones of the original work and re-orchestrating sextuplets; this is a flawed paradise, fraught with That I, who first brought death on all, am graced income by giving lectures, piano recitals and radio in a less “astringent” manner. danger. Amidst the seductive lushness of half-quoted The source of Life; ..”. broadcasts in Switzerland and abroad. motifs from Tristan und Isolde lie threat, the seeds of (Paradise Lost Book XI, lines 167-169) 1944 destruction. 1939 A further serious illness. Lucifer’s lines, meanwhile, frequently emphasise Acceptance of guilt is the first building-block of Between the outbreak in September of World War II pride in the possession of Wings - “these poor human redemption for Milton. Markevitch, on the other hand, and Christmas, completes fifty minutes (the first, and 1946 beings, they have no wings!” - thus is the music of posits redemption through a vague, almost Hollywood- only “half” ever finished) of La Taille de l’Homme. During a return visit to Switzerland, writes Made in L’Envol d’Icare quoted. The early exposition of the ised notion of Love and aspiration towards “the Spirit”. Italy, a political study inspired in part by his experiences character of Satan takes place against the Icare music Thus reads Eve’s final peroration, in Markevitch’s 1940 with the Florentine partigiani, which meets with for the ‘observation of birds (flight of doves)’ - he is “pantheistic” version: Visits Florence with Kyra, where he composes the ‘vocal considerable success on its publication in Italy, France thus characterised as a sort of pterodactyl, through this symphony’ Lorenzo il Magnifico on texts by Lorenzo de’ and Britain. angular, ill-at-ease music. There are echoes, too, of the “Témoigne que je vois, lié par l’Amour Medici himself. Markevitch has failed to comply with music of Cantate, and especially of the poetic style of L’Esprit qui se disperse Swiss residency laws, and is thus technically stateless 1947-77 Cocteau’s text for that work. Par tout l’univers! upon Mussolini’s declaration of war. He therefore Is naturalised as an Italian citizen in 1947. Following the The text for this work as a whole does present Brille toujours plus intensément, remains in Italy, where Kyra teaches dance. dissolution of his first marriage, he marries Topazia problems as a literary entity. While it is proudly Afin que les hommes Caetani, descendant of a distinguished Roman indicated as being assembled by the composer after Apprennent à se vaincre eux-mêmes”. 1941-47 artistocratic line. Milton, it seems to follow a relatively naive idea of what The Markevitches live in the “villino” (little Villa), His international conducting career over this thirty- Milton was about, but in no detail reproduces any “Bear testimony that I see, bound by Love provided by the art historian Bernard Berenson - who year period will take Markevitch to music directorships authentic text, and in many respects is often contrary to That Spirit which is present describes the house as a “cottage in my grounds” - on in Stockholm (1952-55), Montreal (1956-60), Havana its spirit. For example, Part II begins with a Eve Throughout the Universe! his “Villa I Tatti” estate at Settignano, three miles (1957-58), Paris (the Concerts Lamoureux, 1957-61), parlaying a (near-blasphemous?) quotation of the words Shine ever more radiantly, outside Florence. Dallapiccola is among his circle of Madrid (1965-69) and Monte Carlo, and with the Santa of the abandoned Christ on the Cross, that nowhere So that men friends. In October 1941, he completes for the pianist Cecilia Orchestra in Rome. He also gives conducting appears in Milton: May learn to gain the victory within themselves”. Nikita Magaloff, another Florence resident, his courses in Salzburg, Mexico, Moscow, Madrid, Monte Variations, Fugue and Envoi on a Theme of Händel for Carlo and Weimar. Mon Dieu, mon Dieu, Pourquoi m’as-tu Markevitch’s Eve is a self-pitying rag doll; Milton’s has solo piano, destined to be his last original composition. abandonée?” dignity and responsibility. Indeed, a Lucifer who can 1978 (My God, my God, why hast thou forsaken me?) declare “Quelle proie facile” (“what easy prey”) or can 1942 Markevitch has effectively supressed his music for 35 refer to Eve as “stupide épouvantail” (“foolish He falls seriously ill towards the end of a “hard, hard years when he receives an invitation from Hervé Thys to Eve’s entreaty, scarecrow”) does not fall from the pages of Milton, in winter” (as he descibes it to Alex de Graeff in a letter of conduct Icare and Le Paradis Perdu for the Royal whose poetic vision the opponents in this cosmic clash 7th April, 1942). The composer senses himself to be Philharmonic Society in Brussels. The concert is a Mon Dieu, Ne me punis pas ... Ne me châtie pas ... that affects the destiny of the known universe inhabit a “dead between two lives” during his recuperation in success, and leads to over one hundred performances in Je n’ai plus de repos” higher moral plane. Redemption is achieved (all too Fiesole; indeed, during the coming year he embarks on fifteen countries during the following three years. (My God, punish me not ... chastise me not ... quickly) without effort or confrontation with the serious activity as conductor, giving a number of In connection with the Brussels performances I no longer have any peace) terrifying majesty of God. The “Spirit” that “points the concerts in Florence. (which Markevitch conducts himself), David Drew, then way” is a cross between a Victorian sentimental Director of New Music at Boosey & Hawkes music reads somewhat contrary to the penitent, anguished, comfort-cushion and some kind of pantheistic prop of 1943 publishers, London, makes contact with Markevitch. remorseful figure painted by Milton, whose Eve is full Futurism. In October, Germany invades Italy. Markevitch Progressively over the next few years, Drew persuades of wonder and humility that she should be both the We should perhaps, charitably, conclude that our renounces his conducting commitments to join the Markevitch to unearth his entire œuvre, for which bringer of Death into the world, yet also granted to be musically gifted, very young composer had merely Partisans, becoming a member of the Committee of Boosey & Hawkes offer a new and comprehensive the vehicle for the transmission of Life. normal literary abilities. His anthropocentric, twentieth- Liberation of the Italian Resistance (the ‘Partigiani’). He publication contract. century individualistic view contrasts with the way 8.570773 611 8.570773 570773 bk Markevitch 15/7/08 19:35 Page 10

Watson had excellent connections. Completely entranced found it to rehearse this difficult work, and how close he Nevertheless, this series of recordings, commenced was still dogged by being pigeonholed among the ranks by Marie-Laure’s descriptions of her Igor’s new oratorio, came to cancelling the performance. Yet in Etre et avoir eighteen years later in December 1995, are the première of “All Americans [who] were more or less equally he proposed that Markevitch fly to London (which he did, été, Markevitch speaks only with admiration of the ease recordings of all but a handful of works preserved from unacceptable. One might therefore pick the richest in a biplane of British Imperial Airways, his first flight of working with the expert English chorus and 1930s radio broadcasts, and a technically poor recording without compunction”. Her second marriage in ever) to meet the musical eminences of the B.B.C., for orchestra. Tellingly, the autobiography also relates that on 78s of L’Envol d’Icare dating from 1938. December 1893 with Edmond de Polignac, the aristocrat which he, Watson, would furnish the introductions. The he met Kyra Nijinska again in London, and that she who yearned to be recognised as a composer, proved trip was successful, and a performance of Le Paradis could not wait to give him her impressions of the 1980 perfect for both, given her wealth and his impoverished Perdu was arranged quickly for the same December, to be rehearsals of the work, in which she found deep Publication by Gallimard of the composer’s state, a mutual desire for a mariage blanc with no active conducted by Hermann Scherchen. Scherchen had inspiration. The autobiography does not mention the autobiography, Être et avoir été (Being and having sexual component, and above all their shared and deeply already planned a “première” of the work for Brussels in presence of Marie-Laure, whose postmarked letters on been). To some extent a roman à clef, the book reveals genuine passion for music. 1936, but was not averse to what he interpreted as a hotel stationery are unarguable. The composer must much even as it hides or obfuscates more. By the 1920s Winnaretta’s salon was well studio performance in London at an earlier date. have been playing quite a juggling match on buses, in In this year, Markevitch undertakes revision of established as the most influential in Paris; she had The exploratory trip to London was fateful in other taxis and in hotel dining rooms. some of his 1930s compositions, in preparation for a already supported by generous patronage such ways, as well. Igor unexpectedly ran into Vaslav This evidently tense London sojourn with Marie- series of performances in Brussels. composers as Chabrier, Fauré, Satie, Falla, Delius, Nijinsky’s daughter, Kyra. He saw her as a “butterfly Laure clearly marked the effective end of their intimate Poulenc and Stravinsky; the organ-builder Aristide emerged from her chrysalis”, and unashamedly writes, relationship; for in 1936 Markevitch would marry Kyra 1983 Cavaillé-Coll; and painters Manet, Monet, John Singer “I remember the utter delight of that moment of emotion Nijinska, only daughter of the great Vaslav, and their Only a short time after his first, triumphant return visit Sargent and many others. Marcel Proust, too, was an when fever invades one’s veins. I had never known such son, namesake of his grandfather, was to be born early to Ki’ev, his city of birth, Markevitch suddenly falls ill, habitué of her circle, during the years when A la an intensity as I now felt with her. Kyra had acquired a in 1937. dying in Antibes on 7th March. recherche du temps perdu was forming in his much greater ease, and I felt her taken over by a new Was Marie-Laure - directly descended from the imagination; as was the violinist Olga Rudge, mistress inner confidence”. Such a thunderbolt could only Marquis de Sade, no less - Igor’s apple of temptation? © 1996 & 2008 Christopher Lyndon-Gee and muse for fifty years to Ezra Pound. proceed in one direction, given opportunity. Was Igor himself the “Eve” of the story, tempted Igor Markevitch was seventeen when Dyagilev Yet Igor, back in Paris, threw himself that summer beyond endurance by a seductive figure dressed in Partita introduced him to the Princesse de Polignac with the into a ceaseless round of balls and parties with Marie- disguise? Was Kyra the “Life” figure assigned to the carefully prepared phrase, “This young man is less wise Laure. Then, a journey to Salzburg in the new Alfa soprano voice in the oratorio? Certainly, when Igor Meudon, 1931; first performed 13th May 1932 at the than he may seem, and could well be just as impertinent Romeo, and disaster: a car accident, over the edge of a returned to Paris after the break-up, he portrayed Salle de la Conservatoire, Paris, by Marcelle Meyer as his music”. The Princess was firmly impressed with a steep hillside, saved by a tree that prevented their further himself to all and sundry as the “prey of a wealthy, (piano) with the Orchestre ‘La Sérénade’ conducted performance of Markevitch’s Piano Concerto specially fall. Neither was hurt, but both were deeply shocked. emotionally needy older woman who had used him ‘to by Roger Désormière. mounted at her atelier, and he became a regular at her This too, over many months to come, may have fill her idle hours and sharpen her egocentricity by Dedicated to la Princesse Edmond de Polignac Friday circle. Two years later, following Dyagilev’s contributed to the decline in their affections. creating imaginary dramas of which she was the death, it was Nadia Boulanger, with whom Markevitch Following a lengthy summer journey to Mount victim’”. It was against the immaturity of this vengeful Being launched by the all-but-unassailable imprimatur was studying, that used her influence to bring about the Athos in Greece, and strenuous efforts to have his outburst that Winnaretta de Polignac closed ranks with of the great Dyagilev thrust the seventeen-year-old commission from the Princess for a further “work in French text for Le Paradis translated into English by his her aristocratic friend. Markevitch straight into the most elevated circles of concertante style for piano and small orchestra”, to be long-standing but unreliable friend Edward James The music of Le Paradis Perdu is richer and more Parisian musical life. One of the pivotal figures in those completed by May 1931 for performance at the salon. (- several collaborators felt that an oratorio derived, varied than anything we have heard before from circles was the American-born heiress to the Singer Boulanger had to intervene several times to soften the however distantly, from Milton’s great poem could not Markevitch; it is also highly self-referential to other sewing-machine fortune, who entered Parisian society impact of the inexperienced and rather arrogant young possibly be given in a foreign tongue), when December works within his œuvre, both past and to come. The as Winnaretta Singer, but reigned over it for close on composer’s gaffes: his expectation that the Princesse de of 1935 came around, the conductor Hermann opening, for instance, reproduces exactly the same fifty years as the Princesse Edmond de Polignac (her Polignac would pay for the orchestral parts in addition Scherchen was taken ill, and Markevitch himself agreed music that will be used for the setting of ‘Quant’è bella first marriage to another Prince, Louis-Vilfred de Scey- to the agreed commission fee; his lateness in completing to conduct the B.B.C. performance of Le Paradis Perdu. giovinezza …’ from Lorenzo il Magnifico. Yes indeed, Montbéliard, having been annulled in 1892). the score, when the orchestra had already been engaged We know from extant letters that he travelled to London ‘… che si sfugge tuttavia,’ - “How wondrous beautiful is Acquisition of an elevated title had been of prime by Winnaretta for May 1931; Markevitch’s insensitivity with Marie-Laure, staying together at the Connaught youth, that is yet so fleeting!” - for Adam and Eve are importance to her, since, though her mother Isabella was the following year (a year late) in suggesting that the Hotel; the same letters relate how extremely stressful he already in the shadow of the Fall. We know their fate; French and Winnaretta had grown up partly in Paris, she Polignac salon might be a good venue for a “dress 8.570773 10 7 8.570773 570773 bk Markevitch 15/7/08 19:35 Page 8

rehearsal” prior to a public performance by the new he has talent, but he’s very young, of course, eighteen tranquillo of its opening. The reprise is profoundly social conduct. Only two years later, the very public organisation “Sérénade”, founded by the violinist [sic]”. An acute critic, Winnaretta’s niece Marie- varied from the exposition; more of an extended coda in split between her and Markevitch would require all the Yvonne Giraud, now the Marquise Illan de Casa Fuerte, Blanche de Polignac wrote in her diary, “Markevitch’s fact, with an elegiac tone, and a final major-minor weight of Winnaretta Singer’s rank and respected and something of a rival patroness of music. (Poulenc, it Partita, played at Tante Winnie’s, was even more dominant seventh chord that predicts the superb ending position to shore up her standing in society. But for the is worth mentioning, endeared himself to Winnaretta at gripping than [at its performance] at the Sérénade. of Le Nouvel Age, one of his true masterworks, that is to time being, all was simple and spontaneous in the fresh just the same period; he knew how to treat her with Implacable music, serene in its nastiness, perfectly come in 1938. carefree days of new love. “This stay in Italy with diplomacy, humour, charm … and prompt delivery of constructed. Despite its harshness, one had the Writing in a long article in La Revue Musicale in Marie-Laure was the best period of our love”, relates his scores. Markevitch, on the other hand, while praising satisfaction that is given by perfect things, by closed 1933 of Winnaretta Singer’s importance as a patron of Markevitch in his autobiography. “The success [of her influence and taste, characterised her as presiding circles. One mysteriously perceived that, within, a music, Henri Prunières noted, “The Partita of Psaume] in Rome seemed to imbue me with such over her salons with “her intimidating Dantesque mathematical problem was resolved”. On 21st March Markevitch already represents the past of this qualities in her eyes that she behaved quite profile. Cocteau”, continues Markevitch, “gave her the 1933 the Partita was given again at the prestigious Salle adolescent, but what force, what sense of architecture is submissively”. The quite other reception of whistling, nickname Dante and supposed that she loved music in Pleyel, at a special concert honouring the Princesse de manifest there … it affirms an original and dominating shouting and heckling that the same work received in the same way as a sewing machine loves textiles”.) Polignac. Stravinsky, as ever importantly busy temperament”. Florence led to inconsolable tears on the part of Marie- Nevertheless, the “intimidating” Princess declared elsewhere, failed to attend; works by Fauré, Germaine Laure. And then she did what the wealthy do by way of herself well pleased, proud even of the Partita. She Tailleferre, Ravel, Milhaud and Poulenc were played to Le Paradis Perdu (Paradise Lost) consolation: she bought a new Alfa Romeo, capable of missed the first performance owing to indisposition, but perfection (according to Henri Prunières: see reference 200 kilometres an hour, with the tender words, “This wrote the next day, “From all directions I’m being told below). Unwisely, Markevitch played the solo piano Corsier-sur-Vevey & Villars (Switzerland), 1933-34; will be our car”. of the enormous success of the Partita. What great part in his own work, causing Marie-Blanche de first performed 20th December 1935 It was during this mostly idyllic journey that regret for me not to have been there for this triumph”. Polignac - who had already heard the work at least three at the Queen’s Hall, London, by the BBC Symphony Markevitch began to conceive and plan his largest She finalised plans for the work’s second performance times - to confide to her diary, “Markevitch massacred Orchestra and Chorus, Oda Slobodskaya (soprano), composition to date, Le Paradis Perdu; indeed, once the at her salon less than two weeks later on 2nd June, and his Partita”. Betty Bannerman (mezzo-soprano), and Hugues long trip was over, Marie-Laure returned to Paris, was so well satisfied that she requested it be repeated on Marie-Blanche shrewdly and accurately sums up the Cuénod (tenor); conducted by the composer. leaving Igor to his composition at Corsier-sur-Vevey, the spot - this despite the nine months full-term pregnant essence of this music. Its Ouverture and Rondo are dry Dedicated to Madame la Vicomtesse de Noailles where he began a journal entitled “The Quest for state of the soloist, Marcelle Meyer, who nevertheless exercises in compositional technique; baroque Paradise Lost”. Marie-Laure wrote daily, and came to played with great energy and “élan”. Markevitch reports abstractions that give particular attention to A journey to Italy; a memorable “scandal” attending the visit after a few weeks. Her tenderness touched him; for overhearing a gentleman audience member saying that Markevitch’s fascination with cross rhythms and Florentine première of Psaume (- how much did her part, the creative atmosphere of tranquil yet charged he might perhaps “leave before the third performance”, ambiguous metres. From the very first measure of the Markevitch wish for a “scandal” to measure up to that energy that she found caused her to stay longer than at which his lady companion assured him that “two Ouverture, the barline is denied, with a 12/8 grouping in which had accompanied the Parisian première of intended. Time elapsed, she returned to Paris. different works had previously been played” and that the lower strings resolutely opposed to the pounding 4/4 Stravinsky’s Sacre du Printemps twenty-one years Correspondence with the influential Swiss writer she had distinctly “preferred the second”. Markevitch of the timpani and solo piano, the latter at this point before -); the initiation of what was to be a long-lasting Charles-Ferdinand Ramuz, and a visit from Jean cannot, in his autobiography, resist observing that the merely accompanying. 7/8 and 5/8 groupings abound. new friendship, of significant personal assistance during Cocteau, both played a part in the gestation of earlier performance of Partita at the Salle de la The treatment reveals virtuoso compositional technique, the war years, with the great art historian Bernard Markevitch’s text, whose musical ideas were also Conservatoire had “happily had a more educated and yet in the end results strangely four-square, despite all Berenson, his wife Mary and secretary Nicky Mariano rapidly taking shape. Then another letter from Marie- less silly [“sot”!] audience”. Whatever his opinion of the metrical ambiguity. The same can be said for the at Villa I Tatti; new friendships with Petrassi, Laure: her husband Charles - well aware of the liaison her circles, he cannot have been displeased that lightning-fast Rondo finale, which is quite reminiscent Dallapiccola, Mario Labroca and other luminaries of between his wife and her boy lover - was offering to Winnaretta within six months offered him a further of Stravinsky’s 1924 Sonata for solo piano - another Italian musical life - all of this took place in the spring commission Le Paradis Perdu, paying the young commission, at a higher fee, which by early 1933 was work written for and dedicated to the “Princesse of 1934, in company with the 22-year-old Markevitch’s composer a monthly stipend until it was finished. Ten well in progress as the four-movement full orchestral Edmond de Polignac”. It is Markevitch’s middle new lover, ten years his senior, the reckless and months later, in April 1935, the score was complete. The work Hymnes. movement, the Choral, that is most personal in æsthetic hedonistic aristocrat Marie-Laure de Noailles. Wed to composer returned to Paris. Not everyone was as sure as the Princesse of the and most perfect in technique. Placing itself from the the homosexual Vicomte Charles de Noailles in another Here, a new acquaintance awaited him, again by way merits of Partita. Olga Rudge, one of the first to refer to very opening in a bitonal stance, the thematic material is mariage blanc, she bore several striking similarities to of Marie-Laure. A regular visitor to London, she had met the young composer as “Igor II” commented, “He’s developed in masterly fashion, reaching an the Princesse de Polignac - except in matters of one Peter Watson, who had co-founded the review doing what George Antheil was doing ten years ago … appassionato climax before falling back into the discretion, caution and sensitivity to the comme il faut of Horizon with W.H. Auden. Not especially wealthy, 8.570773 8 9 8.570773 570773 bk Markevitch 15/7/08 19:35 Page 8

8.570773 16 NAXOS NAXOS This first volume of the Naxos Igor Markevitch Complete Orchestral Works Edition, to be followed by the seven volumes previously released on Marco Polo, brings together two relatively early compositions of astonishing technical and æsthetic assurance. The Partita is in effect already his second Piano Concerto, written when the composer was twenty. The granitic oratorio Paradise Lost, whose première the composer himself conducted at the BBC in London barely three years MARKEVITCH: later, is among the most important of the composer’s works, bearing comparison with DDD MARKEVITCH: Stravinsky’s contemporaneous Œdipus Rex and Perséphone, yet of striking individuality of vision. 8.570773 Igor Playing Time MARKEVITCH 75:37 (1912-1983) Complete Orchestral Works • 1 Partita (1931) 1 18:03 Le Paradis Perdu

Orchestral Works • 1 1 I. Ouverture: (Paradise Lost) Orchestral Works • 1 Allegro risoluto 4:15 2 2 II. Choral: Andante molto (1933-34) 57:34 e sostenuto 8:32 4 Part I 34:54 3 III. Rondo: Allegro vivace 5 Part II 22:40 ma non troppo 5:17 Martijn van den Hoek, Piano 1 www.naxos.com Disc made in Canada. Printed and assembled USA. Booklet notes in English & 2 Lucy Shelton, Soprano ...... Eve

Sarah Walker, Mezzo-soprano ...... La Vie 2 2008 Naxos Rights International Ltd. Jon Garrison, Tenor ...... Satan 2 Netherlands Concert Choir (Rob Vermeulen, Chorus-master) 2 Arnhem Philharmonic Orchestra Christopher Lyndon-Gee Sung texts and English translations can be accessed at www.naxos.com/libretti/570773.htm Full recording details can be found on the last page of the booklet 8.570773 With special thanks to Mr Jan Taat, Artistic Director for Het Gelders Orkest; to Mr Hans Hierck, 8.570773 initiator of this project; and to Mr David Drew and Ms Janis Susskind of Boosey & Hawkes, who tirelessly supported its completion. Cover image: The Celestial City and the River of Bliss by John Martin (1789-1854) (Agnew’s, London, England / www.bridgeman.co.uk)