CHAN 10144 Front 1.qxd 20/4/07 1:01 pm Page 1 CHAN X10144(4) CHANDOS CLASSICS CHAN 10144 BOOK.qxd 20/4/07 1:02 pm Page 2 Claude Achille Debussy (1862–1918) Complete Works for Orchestra COMPACT DISC ONE La Mer 22:05 The Sea • Das Meer Three symphonic sketches 1 I De l’aube à midi sur la mer 8:22 Lebrecht Collection Lebrecht Très lent – Modéré, sans lenteur (Dans un rythme très souple) 2 II Jeux de vagues 6:23 Allegro (Dans un rythme très souple) 3 III Dialogue du vent et de la mer 7:16 Animé et tumultueux Nocturnes 24:49 4 1I Nuages 7:24 5 2I Fêtes 6:32 6 3I Sirènes 10:47 The Renaissance Singers Grosvenor High School Choir (female voices) Ronnie Lee chorus master Printemps 16:08 Spring • Frühling Claude Debussy in 1905 Symphonic suite Orchestrated by Henri Büsser 7 II Très modéré 9:36 8 III Modéré 6:29 3 CHAN 10144 BOOK.qxd 20/4/07 1:02 pm Page 4 9 Prélude à l’après-midi d’un faune 9:17 3 Deuxième tableau: Le Champ de bataille 8:55 After S. Mallarmé The Battlefield • Das Schlachtfeld Colin Fleming flute solo Modérément animé TT 72:47 4 I Troisième tableau: La Bergerie à vendre 5:51 COMPACT DISC TWO The Sheep-fold for sale • Der Schafspferch zum Verkauf Très modéré Images 33:41 1 1 Gigues 7:20 5 I Quatrième tableau: Après fortune faite 1:37 Rachel Ingleton oboe d’amore solo Fortune made • Das Glück ist gemacht 2 Ibéria Même mouvement 2 I Par les rues et par les chemins 6:44 6 I Epilogue 1:19 3 II Les parfums de la nuit 7:22 Christopher Blake oboe • Colin Stark cor anglais 4 III Le matin d’un jour de fête 4:31 Michael McGuffin piano • Louise Martin harp 5 3 Rondes de printemps 7:34 Children’s Corner 17:08 6 Jeux 17:53 Orchestrated by André Caplet Poème dansé 7 II Doctor Gradus ad Parnassum. Modérément animé 2:50 8 7 Khamma 20:20 III Jimbo’s Lullaby. Assez modéré 3:08 Légende dansée 9 IIII Serenade for the Doll. Allegretto ma non troppo 2:44 TT 72:17 10 IVI The Snow is dancing. Modérément animé 3:05 11 VI The Little Shepherd. Très modéré 2:23 COMPACT DISC THREE 12 VII Golliwog’s Cake-Walk. Allegro giusto 2:48 La Boîte à joujoux 30:21 The Toybox • Die Spielzeugkiste Petite suite 12:53 1 Prélude 2:18 Orchestrated by Henri Büsser Très modéré 13 II En bateau. Andantino 3:33 2 Premier tableau: Le Magasin de jouets 10:20 14 III Cortège. Moderato 3:19 The Toyshop • Der Spielzeugladen 15 IIII Menuet. Moderato 3:01 Modéré (d’abord hesitant, puis en animant beaucoup) 16 IVI Ballet. Allegro giusto 2:55 4 5 CHAN 10144 BOOK.qxd 20/4/07 1:02 pm Page 6 17 Marche écossaise sur un thème populaire 6:03 7 Rapsodie for alto saxophone and orchestra 10:09 Allegretto scherzando Orchestrated by Jean Roger-Ducasse Très modéré 18 Danse 5:42 Gerard McChrystal saxophone Orchestrated by Maurice Ravel Allegretto 8 Sarabande 4:29 TT 72:47 Orchestrated by Maurice Ravel Avec une élégance grave et lente COMPACT DISC FOUR Fantaisie 24:54 9 L’Isle joyeuse 6:11 For piano and orchestra Orchestrated by Bernardino Molinari 1 I Andante ma non troppo – Allegro giusto 8:31 Quasi una cadenza – Tempo: modéré et très souple 2 II Lento e molto espressivo – 8:11 10 3 Allegro molto 8:10 La plus que lente 5:17 Anne Queffélec piano Lent Derek Bell cimbalom solo 4 Première rapsodie 7:37 For orchestra with principal clarinet 11 Clair de lune 4:15 Rêveusement lent Orchestrated by André Caplet Christopher King clarinet Andante, très expressif TT 73:36 Danses 9:49 For harp and string orchestra Ulster Orchestra 5 Danse sacrée. Très modéré 4:50 Yan Pascal Tortelier 6 Danse profane. Modéré 4:59 Rachel Masters harp 6 7 CHAN 10144 BOOK.qxd 20/4/07 1:02 pm Page 8 You perhaps do not know that I was destined for The first complete performance of the Claude Debussy: Orchestral Works the fine life of a sailor and that it was only by Nocturnes was given in October 1901 by the chance that I was led away from it. But I still have Lamoureux Orchestra conducted by Camille a great passion for Her (the sea). You will say that Chevillard, but the idea for the work can be COMPACT DISC ONE dawn to midday’ – even if Satie, that arch the ocean doesn’t wash the hills of Burgundy… traced back through a projected violin La Mer debunker, wickedly declared that he especially and that what I am doing might be like painting a concerto to a suite of three ‘twilight scenes’ Impressionism: Style of painting, music, or writing, liked the bit at a quarter to eleven! landscape in a studio. But I have endless (Scènes au crépuscule) which Debussy had such as to give general tone and effect without Debussy began work on La Mer in memories, and, in my opinion, they are worth sketched in 1892, inspired by a series of elaborate finish or detail. Burgundy in 1903 and finished it in more than reality, which generally weighs down poems by Henri de Régnier. As for the title, Debussy may not have had the Concise Oxford Eastbourne two years later. He described it as one’s thought too heavily. that seems to have been suggested by the Dictionary to hand in 1908, but it was ‘three symphonic sketches’: ‘From dawn to paintings of Whistler, who regarded art as ‘the perhaps some similar half-truth of a definition, midday on the sea’, ‘Play of the waves’, and Nocturnes poetry of sight, as music is the poetry of with its implication of things vague or ill- ‘Dialogue of the wind and the sea’. The first Debussy wrote extensively about the sound’. Hence he named many of his defined, which made him react so strongly performance took place on 15 October 1905, inspiration and genesis of the Nocturnes and canvasses Harmonies, Symphonies, and against the term ‘impressionism’ being applied with the Lamoureux Orchestra conducted by everywhere his musician’s and writer’s ear was Nocturnes. to his music. ‘A term used with absolute Camille Chevillard. informed by his no less keen artist’s eye. Parts inaccuracy by… imbeciles’, he complained to The problem was that the titles and subtitles of this account could easily have come from Printemps his publisher Jacques Durand. After all, of Debussy’s works were often more useful to an exhibition catalogue: Debussy submitted Printemps (Spring) to the nothing could have more elaborate ‘finish’ and him than to the listener. They were starting Nuages renders the immutable aspects of the sky Académie des Beaux-Arts as an envoi – a ‘detail’ than the intricate score of La Mer. points only, stimulating his imagination and and the slow, solemn motion of the clouds, fading composition assignment – during his unhappy Nevertheless, an impression of ‘general setting in motion the creative process, but they away in grey tones lightly tinged with white. Fêtes tenure of a Prix de Rome scholarship at the tone and effect’ is at least part of what did not dictate the course of the musical gives us the vibrating atmosphere with sudden Villa Medici; moreover, he bent the rules by Debussy wished to communicate, and surely events. That was what contemporary critics flashes of light. There is also the episode of the sending it in a piano duet version, rather than music is ideally suited to the impressionist found so hard to grasp as they argued the procession (a dazzling, fantastic vision) which passes as an orchestral score. He claimed that the full concept of the study of light and its changing pros and cons of Debussy ‘the impressionist’. through the festive scene and becomes merged in score – which included a wordless, ‘humming’ effect on nature. Monet’s famous paintings of In his book Impressionism in Music (1973) it. But the background remains persistently the chorus (bouche fermée) – had been the west front of Rouen Cathedral at Christopher Palmer identifies three same: the festival, with its blending of music and accidentally destroyed by fire, but he made no contrasting times of day give a sense of preoccupations of the impressionist painters: luminous dust, participating in the cosmic rhythm. attempt to reconstruct it. Only some twenty- progression, but also of discontinuity, existing Nature, distance, and dreams. It is a measure Sirènes depicts the sea and its countless rhythms, five years later did an orchestral version finally out of time – a sort of ‘frozen music’. of Debussy’s greatness that in La Mer he both and presently, amongst the waves silvered by the appear. This was prepared in 1913 by the Debussy’s La Mer, however, unfolds in real fulfills and transcends them. In a letter to the moonlight, is heard the mysterious song of the conductor and composer Henri Büsser, time to render more vivid his panorama ‘from composer Messager he wrote: Sirens as they laugh and pass on. working with Debussy’s guidance from the 8 9 CHAN 10144 BOOK.qxd 20/4/07 1:02 pm Page 10 piano duet parts. Unfortunately the chorus but rather goes further into its nostalgia and Spanish and French respectively. The folk-tune transformed into the joyful peals of a carnival was omitted. light, with subtlety, unease, and richness.’ quoted several times in Gigues, though day as the finale follows without a break, its Debussy’s initial inspiration for Printemps Mallarmé’s poem evokes a mythical landscape fragmentarily, is ‘The Keel Row’, which festive awakening slightly mocking the was Botticelli’s painting Primavera, and as the and the sultry thoughts and erotic longings of a Debussy’s friend Charles Bordes used in 1890 romance of the night before.