Maurice Ravel and Gabriel Faure each contributed a single string quartet to the chamber music repertoire, but both works are masterful reflections of their distinct musical voices and the broader evolution of French music in the early 20th century. Ravel's String Quartet in F major, composed in 1903, stands as a defining work of French impressionism in music. Influenced by his teacher Faure and Debussy's quartet from 1893, Ravel's quartet is nevertheless strikingly original. The piece follows the traditional four-movement structure, but with bold harmonic language, refined orchestration for strings, and rhythmic innovation. The first movement is lyrical and elegant, while the second features pizzicato and dynamic contrasts that create a vibrant, almost playful texture. The third movement offers deep introspection, and the final movement reintroduces themes in a whirling, virtuosic conclusion. In contrast, Gabriel Faure's String Quartet in E minor, Op.121 is a late work, completed in 1924, shortly before his death. It was his only string quartet, and it reflects a more introspective, spiritual tone. Faure, already nearly deaf and physically weakened, poured into the music a sense of serenity and resignation. The three-movement structure (unusual for a quartet) avoids virtuosic display in favor of subtle textures and modal harmonies. The work unfolds slowly, with long, flowing lines and a remarkable economy of means, demonstrating his mature mastery of form and expression. Together, Ravel's and Faure's quartets represent two ends of a stylistic spectrum: Ravel's vibrant, youthful exploration of sound and structure contrasts with Faure's meditative farewell. Both works, however, reveal the expressive depth and refinement that define French chamber music at it's finest. As an important and substantial bonus to this recording we hear Ravel's Introduction & Allegro for flute, harp, clarinet and string quartet, a highly original and attractive work. Played by the Quartetto Nous, the Italian string quartet also engaged in the recording of the complete Shostakovich string quartets for Brilliant Classics, to great critical acclaim.

Two metaphors intertwine in the Roseti del mare (Rose gardens of the sea). The rose garden is the shared place, the multifaceted, multicoloured, thorny and delicate project that well embodies the evolutionary drive of the young performers of Polimnia. The enigmatic vastness of the sea provides the setting in the consolidated repertoire of many great composers. It's presence is manifest in Robert Schumann's Romanzen fur Frauenstimmen (Meerfey, Der Wassermann, In Meeres Mitten), and it recurs in the choices of numerous French composers (for example, in C. Debussy's La Mer), a trait that clearly re-sonates in the fluid and elegant writing of Gabriel Faure featured here. Across it's surface, the sea incarnates the spontaneity, luminosity, and immediacy of Faure's invention, while in it's depths resides the Schumannian style, introspective and severe, directing it's gaze towards Reflection and the layering of Thought. With the Polimnia vocal ensemble, I chose to work on a challenging project, far removed from easy transcriptions or more straightforward choral adaptations. For all of us, it was like going out into the open sea, with no footholds or furrows of well-trodden routes. A treacherous journey, devoid of certainties yet full of opportunities for a totally shared research into the meanings and sounds expressed by the young performers already rich in their own time, ranging from 17 to 25 years of age. The fact that young is not an adjective to be equated with superficial is the conviction I have matured in my long experience as director of the children's choir from which the Polimnia Ensemble almost entirely originates. The result we have achieved is the impetus that moves us towards new challenges, new future projects. Claudio Fenoglio

This set brings together twelve French-trained pianists performing thirteen French works for piano and orchestra of which ten are premiere recordings. Most of the performers knew the composers and worked with them and four works are performed by their composers. It's hard to imagine a more definitive view of this repertoire, recorded at a time when French pianism still had a very distinctive personal voice, and as such, these recordings, many little known, are a permanent legacy of their time.

For his debut album, Arsenis Selalmazidis has chosen works by Schnittke, Ravel and Faure because their work had a profound influence on him. All the pieces are arranged in such a way that the difference between the musical eras is barely noticeable. With this album, it is important to him to give listeners the opportunity to slow down and pause for a moment in the hectic rhythm of modern music.

For her fourth recital on Alpha Classics, mezzo-soprano Kate Lindsey has chosen to record two cycles, Schumann's well-known Frauenliebe und Leben and Faure's La Chanson d'eve, a much more unfamiliar work. What the two cycles have in common is that a woman is their protagonist: "both works deal with innocence, discovery, joy, sorrow and ultimately a deeper understanding of life that only experience can offer", says Kate Lindsey, who has named this new album Samsara, a Sanskrit word that evokes the cycle of life, from birth to death. Eric Le Sage, a great specialist in the music of Faure and Schumann, is the ideal partner for this introspective journey, which also features extracts from Schumann's sublime Myrthen as well as Faure's famed Clair de lune and Chanson d'amour.

French music specialist, Jean-Luc Tingaud, conducts a selection of Faure's secular choral and theatrical music - works that remain relatively little known. Setting a text by Victor Hugo, Les Djinns is heard in Faure's version for choir and orchestra, while his first venture into incidental music, Caligula, focuses largely on the lives of the women in the Roman court rather than the Emperor. Featuring both instrumental and vocal movements, Masques et bergamasques evokes the Arcadian allure of the French f�te galante style - antique, luminous and nostalgic. Also included is the premiere recording of Desire-emile Inghelbrecht's inventive and sympathetic arrangement of Faure's largest piano work, the Theme et variations.

Written between 1887 and 1890, Gabriel Faur�'s Requiem is among the best-loved pieces in the choral repertory. Traditionally, Requiems are serious, prayerful laments for the dead. Faur�'s was altogether different. In place of the usual somber mood, his is noted for it's calm, serene and peaceful outlook. The composer revised and expanded the work several times, but it is the original version that is performed here using period instruments and performance practices. This sublimne recording, featuring Ensemble Aedes and Les Si�cles led by Mathieu Romano, also includes Poulenc's Figure Humaine and Debussy's Trois Chansons

On this double SACD, "Paths into Impressionism" are taken: starting with the two important Sonatas for Violin and Piano by Gabriel Faure, the first of which was already described as a masterpiece by Camille Saint-Saens, and four other short pieces by Faure, the great Salzburg violinist Thomas Albertus Irnberger and the German pianist Michael Korstick, who is already very familiar with the French idiom through many of his own recordings, present further works from the French and Belgian repertoire in their usual masterly and spirited interpretations: the Sonata by the early deceased Guillaume Lekeu, which was commissioned and premiered by Eugene Ysa�e, and Maurice Ravel's Sonata for Violin and Piano (with a Blues as the middle movement), which is characterized by Ravel's view that violin and piano were fundamentally incompatible. The resulting manifold parallel developments and bitonal frictions create specific stimuli, though without showing even the slightest hint of the music falling apart. Ravel's "Kaddish" and the "Berceuse sur le nom de Gabriel Faure", dedicated to his teacher, can also be heard, as well as the Sonata by Francis Poulenc, written in collaboration with Ginette Neveu and dedicated posthumously to Federico Garcia Lorca, and the fascinating work "Theme et variations" by Olivier Messiaen, which he dedicated to his first wife, a violinist, and which still contains many impressionistic elements.

This selection includes a bonus CD with Ms. Jones performing music by Saint-Saëns, Doppler-Zamara and Borne.

Classical Music

REQUIEM

This release features 5 pieces conducted by Ormandy and Davis now available on CD including the two featured recordings plus Ibert's Escales, Faure's Pavane, and Roussel's Bacchus et Ariane Suite No. 2.

Cellist Robin Michael and pianist Daniel Tong present a captivating new recording of the complete works for cello and piano of Gabriel Faure, here presented for the first time on period instruments. Faure's compositions, from salon miniatures such as his elegie and Sicillienne, to his profound Sonatas Nos. 1 & 2, defy conventional categorisation. His harmonic sorcery, stretching beyond his contemporaries, unveils a language both contemporary and timeless. In these late masterpieces, themes from his opera Penelope intertwine with his personal journey, from childhood improvisations to his search for tranquility amid the horrors of war.

F for Faure...� F for Fouchenneret!� The music of Gabriel Faure has been a constant presence with pianist Theo Fouchenneret since childhood, and it's language comes naturally to him. His first Faure album is an invitation to journey through the refined, dreamlike world of the Nocturnes, from the seductive suavity of the first to the sombre purity of the last. An odyssey in thirteen poetic phases into the depths of Faure, into the heart of an inner self, the strongly guarded fortress of this unique, intimate music, free of all external influence, whose unsettling, unutterable beauty Theo Fouchenneret reveals to us.

This anticipated release is the first volume in a new series devoted to the music of Gabriel Faure, which is spearheaded by Louis Lortie. Lortie states in the booklet notes: “this album purposely travels through Faure’s various creative periods, from easily appealing early pieces such as the Pavane and the melodie “Apres un reve” through to the late and unjustly neglected Preludes, a masterpiece of condensed harmonic and melodic audacity.” Lortie’s previous series dedicated to Chopin has garnered critical praise. BBC Music called the series “an exceptionally high order of playing.” The same kind of praise is expected for this new series. French-Canadian pianist Louis Lortie tours extensively across North America, Europe, Asia, and Australia. He has won widespread acclaim for his Chopin and Ravel interpretations, and has performed all five Beethoven concertos and all of the Mozart concertos. The London Times described his playing as “ever immaculate, ever imaginative.”

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REVIEW:

Lortie understands the type of discretion needed to make this music sing, knows the veiled colours it requires, and has the sort of technique to project Fauré’s signature elusiveness. Above all, he identifies fully with Fauré’s chromaticism and understands its use to create space and light.

– ClassicalSource.com