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This is a program of French music, or, to be more accurate,
French-sounding music. To pinpoint the defining characteristics
of a national style is a diverting challenge, and one that's by
no means easy! In the present instance, Debussy helps us when he
refers to "our old harpsichordists [who] held the secret of
that graceful profundity, that emotion without hysteria . .
."
It was probably the French lutenists who were at least partly
responsible for what became known as "le style français."
Briefly, the lute took firm root in France during the 17th and
18th centuries, to the extent that it became practically a
symbol of that country's music. An instrument of immense charm,
the lute challenged its composers to overcome its inherent
shortcomings by making an artistic value out of them. Thus, its
lack of sustain gave rise to florid ornamentation (to give the
illusion of sustain),
its lack of volume to a wide and rich palette of tone-color, and
its limited
harmonic diversity (there is only a certain range of keys in
which you can
play with a given tuning) to an affecting simplicity and
directness. French
lutenists were also famous for their inventiveness in spreading
and
arpeggiating chords, again to overcome the sound's rapid decay,
and this
graceful "style brisé" ("broken style"), as
it was called, became another
defining feature of the French instrumental style.
Gradually, the lute began to yield in popularity to the more
sonorous harpsichord (or clavecin). Louis Couperin, though
multi-talented as an
organist, harpsichordist, and, principally, viol player, didn't
play the
lute, but nevertheless took his illustrious teacher
Chambonnière's lead in
transferring all the chief aspects of lute style to the
harpsichord.
Couperin's Pavane is in F# minor in the original-a highly
unusual key for the clavecin at that time. It was however a
highly characteristic key for the Baroque lute, and was the
favorite key of Ennemond ("Vieux") Gaultier, the
greatest French lutenist. This wonderfully elegiac work is
thought to have been composed as a "tombeau du Vieux
Gaultier" upon Gaultier's death.
This Gaillard is unrelated to the Pavane-it was originally in
a different, distant key-but it couples surprisingly well in
this transcription, where both pieces are arranged in the same
mode of B."
The final flowering of the French style happened in Germany
with J.S.
Bach, the greatest synthesizer of national styles. Although the
title
"French Suites" was not Bach's own, he did write the
title page in French: "Suites pour le clavecin." This
fact, together with the relative simplicity and
succinctness of the writing, is likely what prompted an early
publisher to
call them French. Curiously, the English suites in general
are more based
on French models. Still, the second French Suite does seem to be
the most
consciously "French" of the set. The French elements
can most easily be
detected in the outer movements, with the gorgeous opening
Allemande in
"style brisé," and the final French-style dotted
gigue.
Lennox Berkeley was an Englishman of partial French
extraction who lived for years in Paris, where he studied with
Nadia Boulanger and was close friends with Ravel and Poulenc. He
seems to bridge the "channel divide" in much the same
way that Turner (who so fascinated Debussy) did, and he shares
that painter's magical delicacy. If Berkeley had been a painter,
he would surely have opted to specialize in watercolors (my
intuition entirely!) His Englishness comes out in his
predilection, especially in his opening gestures, for the type
of lyricism found in English folksong. This work, I feel, is no
exception (the well-known lyric "as I walked out one
morning in springtime" comes to mind-my mind, at least!)
The Sonatina was written for Julian Bream in 1958. All
Berkeley's guitar writing (including the lovely concerto written
16 years later) displays an uncanny intuitive grasp of this
unpredictable instrument!
Jacques Ibert's two pieces for guitar have been almost
totally neglected
by guitarists, largely-at least in the case of "Française"-because
of its
awkwardness on 6-string guitar. ("Française" did
become "Guitarre" for
piano-a rare case of pianists pinching from the guitar
repertoire, rather
than the other way around!) They are very welcome additions to
the small
number of guitar works by French composers of standing.
Ibert studied under Ravel's teacher Emile Pessard, hence
perhaps his
Ravelian fastidiousness and refinement-although these are
generally brought
to bear on less ambitious material than that exploited by Ravel.
Debussy's "Children's Corner," together with
Schumann's "Scenes from
Childhood," forms the most touching tribute in music to
childhood fantasy,
"a world seen through both amused and nostalgic eyes,"
to quote the great Swiss pianist Alfred Cortot. The work is
affectionately dedicated to Debussy's beloved daughter Chou-Chou,
who was five when the piece was completed, and who must have
provided its inspiration.
Debussy opens with a glimpse of a child at boring piano
exercises ("Chou-Chou has it in for a little prelude by
Bach . . . every morning she
gives it a bad time; I must say, I can't bring myself to hold it
against her" wrote Debussy to a friend). But then
Debussy, conjuring up the child's inner world and the barely
suppressed imaginative flights which gradually deflect and
inflect the exercise, transforms this study into a poetic
fantasy, à la Chopin.
In Jimbo's Lullaby (perhaps Jumbo became Jimbo in Chou-Chou's
pronunciation; she had an English nanny and mixed French and
English "in the most alarming way," according to her
father), Chou-Chou's toy elephant is sung to sleep. In the next
piece, her doll is the serenader-and Debussy
lends the doll a subtly mechanical aspect. In "The Snow is
Dancing," Debussy evokes the soundless fall of snow,
together with a picture of the child's rapture mingled with
regret. "The Little Shepherd" is quintessential
Debussy; the shepherd plays his solitary flute to the wind,
"which tells in passing the history of the world."
"Golliwog's Cakewalk" caps the set in high spirits and
laughter. Debussy (the child in all of us?) pokes a little fun
with an ironic quote from Wagner's "Tristan." -by Paul
Galbraith |