This album presents a selection of Saint-Saëns’ incidental music and music from his operas. From Samson et Dalila– the only one of Saint-Saëns’ operas to remain in the repertory – we hear two memorable and adrenalin-fueled dances including the famous Bacchanale. Henry VIII drew from the composer music of regal solemnity with plenty of colorful scoring, praised by Gounod. The lukewarm reception to Étienne Marcel came as a bitter disappointment to Saint-Saëns but the customary ballet includes a strong element of delightful 14th-century pastiche. The incidental music to the play Parysatis received tumultuous acclaim at its premiere in 1902 and includes the delightful Airs de ballet flecked by the use of crotales (antique finger-cymbals).

REVIEWS:

Camille Saint-Saens wrote 12 or 13 operas depending on whether you count Fredegonde, an opera by Ernest Guiraud that Saint-Saens completed in 1785. All of them struggled to draw audiences in the composer’s day, and only Samson and Delilah is performed with any frequency now. This disc of orchestral excerpts from the operas Etienne Marcel and Henry VIII, plus `Airs de Ballet’, which is part of the incidental music for Jane Dieulafoy’s play Parysatis, gives us an idea of what we are missing when it comes to Saint-Saens’s writing for the stage. In many of these pieces he builds by repeating phrases often while changing colors. Not all composers do that well, but he does.

The title character of Etienne Marcel took part in the 1358 rebellion against the regency of the Dauphin Charles. Recorded here is the Act III ballet. It is light in style, venturing close to my dreaded French Light Music, though Saint-Saens’s version is better crafted and more inspired than most works in that style. Notable in this music is how the composer begins a section in a light style then turns up weight and speed as it proceeds. `Entry of the Students’ is a lively march. `Musette Warriors’ is stately and sweet-toned with a lot of woodwind color. `Pavane’ is light and elegant with a sweet tune. `Waltz’ begins like dancing elves but gets obstreperous toward the end. `Entry of the Bohemians’ starts in lively fashion, changes mood often, and by the ending all is well. Much of this music resembles turn-of-the-last-century American park music or the British music hall. `Finale’ is the farthest removed from French Light Music. It is regal, dignified, warm, and sometimes sweet, with interesting harmonies and orchestration.

Henry VIII is represented by two suites. The one listed first in the booklet includes the Prelude, excerpts from Acts II and III, and two Tableaux from Act IV. The music of this suite is often wistful and English in tone. A dignified brass fanfare opens Act II, and the entracte music is impressive. Act III opens with a wistful British march with the tune in the strings. Later we hear the winds backed by a soft cover of brass, the brass alone, and then the full orchestra. This music is somber but more dignified than sad.

The second Henry VIII suite is from Act II and called “Fete populaire, Ballet-Divertissement”. This music also has British overtones as well as fine brass playing. The scene titles suggest what the music is like: `Gypsy Dance’,`Scottish Idyll’ (which includes bagpipe drones), and `Hop Festival’, which celebrates the hop-picking season with a warm melody rather than drunken rites.

Parysatis is a play by Jane Dieulafoy about the eponymous powerful and bloodthirsty Persian queen. The music presented here is titled `Aires de Ballet de Parysatis’ and is in four scenes, with a prelude and three exotic dances. Saint-Saens wrote the music for a festival in southern France near the Spanish border. The tone of the work may seem to be African, but it was intended to reflect Persia and probably does.

The excerpts from Samson and Delilah are the well known `Dances of the Priestesses of Dagon’ and the `Bacchanale’.

This disc is a fine introduction to three not-that-well-known Saint-Saens stage works. The performances are terrific—special praise for the first violins. Jun Markl conducts well enough to make me want to hear him take on some of Saint-Saens’s full operas. The sound is first class.

-- MusicWeb International

As one of the last representatives of the French musical romanticism of the 19th century, Camille Saint-Saëns liked ballet music as well as opera, and how successful he was with it is shown not by the partly bad reviews he received at the time, but by the brilliant recordings heard on this CD. Jun Märkl applies himself to the music, its momentum, its colors, and its dramatic content with unerring sensitivity. The Residentie Orkest plays at a very good level, demonstrating the enormous quality of Saint-Saëns’ compositional technique, which many musicologists have called perfect. At the same time, they accused the composer of having composed just technically and not really musically inspired. This CD gives the lie to such critics. The balance and spatiality of the sound recording are also excellent.

-- Pizzicato