April 3, 2019

  • Exploring French Music for String Orchestra

     

    French Music for String Orchestra
    Ciconia Consort/Dick van Gasteren
    Brilliant Classics 95734
    Total Time:  79:45
    Recording:   ****/****
    Performance: ****/****

     

    Founded in 2012, the Dutch ensemble Ciconia Consort makes their premiere debut here on Brilliant Classics under their founding conductor Dick van Gasteren.  They are noted for thematic programming often linking different aspects of the arts and sciences occasionally connected to important social issues.  The ensemble explores a variety of music often including long forgotten and obscure works from across history.  For the most part that aspect is on great display in this fascinating collection of French music for string orchestra.  Often one comes across string orchestras focusing on the rich English musical heritage and so for many this will be a very welcome release.

    The program here includes a somewhat “standard” work in Honegger’s second symphony which may be the sole piece familiar to most listeners.  It is one of two longer symphonic works in this collection, the other being a rarely performed symphony by Jacques Casterede (1926-2014).  A short work by Saint-Saens separates them here and is but one of four shorter pieces on the album.

    Charles Koechlin (1867-1950) studied composition with Massenet and Faure.  They were impressed with his orchestral abilities, as was Debussy.  One might thus here a bit of Impressionism in his earlier pieces, but he eventually discovered his own unique voice.  Though somewhat active at the beginning of the 20th Century, his music essentially all but disappeared though he has been remembered most for his pedagogical treatises.  His Sur les flots lontains, Op. 130 (1933) is a rather fascinating work of moving string writing with subtle shifts in color.  It is a little symphonic poem inspired by the poetry of Paul Claudel.  The piece was unpublished and unperformed until 1987 when Leif Segerstam programmed.  Heinz Holliger subsequently recorded it along with other works by the composer.  It makes for a moving entry into this program.

    A gorgeous Adagio for Strings, Op. 3 (1891) by Guillaume Lekeu (1870-1894) brings us into the sort of Late Romanticism of Mahler but in a far more restrained way.  One can also hear this sense of “unending melody” and chromatic writing that is in a direct line from Wagner.  Lekeu won the Prix de Rome in 1892, but died tragically from contaminated sorbet.  This is a truly moving work that also begins to move us to more modern harmony as it stretches out with darker moments at the doorstep of Schoenberg.  The performance here is just over 13 minutes allowing Lekeu’s lines to unfold gradually and creates a great depth of emotional expression.  Arthur Honegger (1892-1955) was sort of the serious side of the Les Six group of composers.  His music at times hearkens back to the ultra-romanticism of Wagner and Richard Strauss.  We get a chance to hear his brief Hymn for 10 Strings (1920) is a rarer work.  It is filled with a great deal of emotional intensity and swaths of dark sound.  The sinuous chromaticism might also suggest the composer’s own reflection of the war with hope for a better future.  Saint-Saens (1835-1921) is most likely the most familiar of the composers featured on this album.  The great irony is that he was certainly not appreciated by the French in his own time but has held its own from his detractors.  He wrote a single work for string orchestra, the Sarabande in E, Op. 93 (1892), which is usually paired with the Rigaudon (though that adds winds, brass and timpani).  The brief work, which also features a solo violin (gorgeously realized here by Emmy Storms), illustrates the composers interest in “early music” which in this case is the Spanish dance form of the title.  Its Baroque implications serve as a palette cleanser between the two larger symphonies in the program.

    Castrede’s Symphony No. 1 (1952) receives a rare recording and for many will be the primary attraction of the album.  The composer was a student of Messiaen.  He was a noted concert pianist but turned to teaching.  His compositions have tended to garner great attention.  The music is noted for its focus on long melodic lines and modal or diatonic harmony.  This lends the music a modernist feel and a kinship with Honegger’s style.  The symphony is cast in four movements with the first exhibiting this sense of long lines in an often moody, and dark quality.  The jazz-like rhythms of the 1920s begin to assert themselves in the second movement scherzo with a Bartokian-like quality.  A slow movement follows inserting a return to the darker musical musings heard at the beginning.  Here though, harsh accents cut through the texture, in a sense slowing down the jagged rhythms of the scherzo.  As the movement moves toward its conclusion, a lighter, more hopeful major mode expression begins to assert itself shimmering light into the sound.  The finale is a fast-paced work that gives us interesting angular writing with syncopated rhythms making for an exciting conclusion.

    Honegger’s Symphony No. 2 for strings with trumpet (1941) is, next to perhaps Pacific 231, one of his more popular works with a number of fine performances in the catalogue.  Here it is the familiar work among the lesser known and also provides us with a companion work to place against the Castrede.  Honegger’s symphony is for all intents and purposes a war symphony.  It is cast in three movements and progresses from a sense of darkness to light and hope.  The latter is reflected in the appearance of a trumpet which appears in the third movement to lend a sense of possible joy.  Some may hear it as a more sarcastic remark from an occupied France.  Bartok is also not far off, especially in the devastating central movement which moves through the darkness inexorably.  In some respects, it is like a slow death march.  There is a bleakness that also opens the work with dissonance creating a sense of unsettled atmosphere until it is brutally overcome with sharp low strings.  Van Gasteren’s set up for this shift is handled quite well here making the transition quite nicely into the “Allegro” and back again later before the movement’s more brutal side is subdued.  The finale tends to move us toward the light and slight glimpse of celebration.  The trumpet enters in an almost hymn-like melodic idea with the strings moving about beneath in a fuller sound with gestures reminiscent of Les Six style.  The closing major harmony seems almost like an afterthought after the intense emotional build of the work.  These aspects always make for a fascinating listen and one will likely return to this performance again.

    Overall, this is a truly impressive debut.  The program has a great sense of continuity but enough variety that one can get a sense for the musical milieu of these composers and their particular way of writing for strings.  The ensemble manages to create a very full and rich sound which is aided here by the BC engineers who have found a warm ambient sound.  The Koechlin feels a little dry at times, but this seems to get corrected for the rest of the recording.  Most of the repertoire here is unchallenged.  The Honegger symphony will have its favorite performances from Karajan, Ansermet, and perhaps Munch, but the sound here is quite good and the Ciconia Consort make a good case for van Gasteren’s reading of this work.  It is hard to really pick a find here that is not worth the acquaintance and the program itself is certainly noteworth.