EDITH CANAT DE CHIZY Times

TIMES

GÉRARD PESSON Aggravations et final

Gérard Pesson is a leading French composer of his generation, albeit one whose music bears the mark of a true Germanophile. This is perhaps best heard in the last two works on this disc: Wunderblock (Nebenstück II) “underwrites” the Maestoso from Bruckner’s Sixth Symphony in a manner reminiscent of Hans Zender’s transcriptions. For all the distortions and parasitical incursions from elsewhere, the substructure of the original is audible throughout.

This kind of homage is one aspect of Pesson’s output generally; another is best represented by the playful Cassation for string trio, piano and clarinet, whose evanescent centrepiece is the opening of Tristan as reworked by Wagner himself many years later. Most of the musical argument, however, is embodied in a language clearly derived form Lachenmann’s musique concrète instrumentale: here the musicians (as with the orchestra and chamber ensemble in Aggravations et final and Rescousse, respectively) engage in rhythmical scrapings, upward glissandi and breath-sounds, albeit in a rather different expressive intention from that of the German composer. That intention seems more overtly playful and allusive, and (dare I say it) more “French” in its focus on minute details; what is sometimes missing is the granite-like logic of Lachenmann’s long-term planning. Lest I appear to judge one composer according to the values of another, I should say that Pesson’s own notes are not always as helpful as one might wish. (In them one recognises the Frenchman, just as Lachenmann’s mark him out as German.) What is beyond doubt, and admirably, is the precision of these performances (by no means forgetting the pianist Hermann Kretzschmar in Vexierbilder II), which would do any composer proud. (Fabrice Fitch / Gramophone)

Alla Francesca / Brigitte Lesne THIBAUT DE CHAMPAGNE Le Chansonnier du Roi

Mentioned by Dante amongst 'the most illustrious poets of his time, Thibaut de Champagne (1201-1253), also called 'Thibaut the Songwriter', was one of France's greatest trouvères (or 'musician-poet' in langue d’oïl).

He left us some sixty songs, cultivating highly varied musical genres: songs of love and of the crusades, pastourelles, hymns to the Virgin, jeux-partis… Count of Champagne and King of Navarre, grandson of Marie de France and great-grandson of Eleanor of Aquitaine, he was chosen by the Holy See and numerous barons to lead a new crusade in 1239. A seal from 1226 portrays him on horseback, brandishing his sword.

This disc proposes an anthology of his compositions, all coming from the very famous songbook copied at the end of the 13th century: the 'King's manuscript'. As a counterpoint to the songs and in harmony with them, it also presents motets and instrumental dances representative of the musical repertoires of the period.

Olivier Cavé JOSEPH HAYDN - DOMENICO SCARLATTI Chiaro e Scuro

 

The booklet for this release on France's Outhere label devotes considerable space to trying to demonstrate that Joseph Haydn might have known the keyboard sonatas of Domenico Scarlatti. The argument isn't implausible-several of the paths lead through the opera librettist Pietro Metastasio, who threw work the young Haydn's way and apparently had a collection of Scarlatti pieces-but it's at least partly irrelevant. There may be a "shared artistic sensibility" between Scarlatti and Haydn, based on a certain bent toward the unexpected, but in terms of technical structure the analogy doesn't hold up: Scarlatti uses two-part texture because that was a common way of writing keyboard music in the Baroque, while Haydn uses it because he was writing technically simple music for pianists of modest means, including himself. The Scarlatti sonatas interspersed among the multi-movement Haydn pieces on the album come off not as manifestations of a shared sensibility but as brilliant virtuoso pieces juxtaposed with placid, even if inventive, Classical ones. All this said, the performances by French pianist Olivier Cavé are sharp, and the contrast is an unusual one, effectively carrying something of the great shift from Baroque to Classical sensibilities. The Haydn sonatas are early pieces (one called a Divertimento, another a Partita), and Cavé is among the pianists who are finding striking things in the keyboard music of the first part of Haydn's career by applying a modicum of seriousness to the music. The excellent studio sound from the Bremen Sendesaal is a major attraction. Recommended for sheer novelty and for some great music that's not so often played. (James Manheim)