Didier Holleaux

Didier Squiban has been a loyal companion of the Orchester National de Bretagne for over twenty years. After the recording of his first two symphonies, the Symphonie Bretagne and the Symphonie Iroise, we were able to complete the symphonic trilogy imagined by Didier Squiban by recording in 2021, the Symphonie du Ponant, in the company of great performers such as Baptiste Trotignon on the piano and Airelle Besson on trumpet. La Symphonie du Ponant looks away, towards the seven islands off Brittany, towards the setting sun, towards the high seas… This symphony composed of Breton melodies is sublimated by improvisations proposed by masters of the genre. An orchestration full of colors, magnified thanks to the richness of a symphony orchestra and the direction of the Morlaisian Ariane Matiakh.

In the midst of the artistic debate between the German and Italian styles, as the Age of Enlightenment was lighting its final fires during the reign of Louis XVI and Marie Antoinette, Johann Christian Bach was presenting his Amadis de Gaule to Paris. Reduced and revised from a libretto of Quinault for Lully, this operatic work is shot through from one end to the other with the first frissons of the awakening Romanticism.

Mathilde von Guise was one of Hummel’s best known operas, partly because the composer actually issued a printed piano score which was published in Leipzig in 1823. It was written for Vienna where it was premiered, in German, at the Kartnertortheater. As was the case with all German lyric drama at the time, it was in the form of a singspiel: with spoken dialogue. Hummel decided to perform the work again in 1821 at the Court Theatre in Weimar where he was working and made some minor revisions to the piece, along with changing the overture.

Synthesizer-playing composer Didier Marouani is the founding member of the French synth-pop band Space. He was classically trained as a pianist at the Paris Conservatoire, but recorded his first album as a singer in 1975. Space was formed by Marouani in 1977, after he decided to focus more on composition. The group's biggest international success came later that year with the singles "Magic Fly," which hit the U.K.'s Top Ten and, to a lesser extent, "Carry on Turn Me On," both of which appeared on charts in a number of countries. Space toured and recorded for the next few years and continued to make well-received records, although no singles duplicated the success of "Magic Fly." After several albums, a rift occurred in the band; 1980's Deeper Zone, recorded under the name of Space, was actually an album by band members Roland Romanelli and Jannick Top, who took over and kept the band name, but went relatively unnoticed…

Synthesizer-playing composer Didier Marouani is the founding member of the French synth-pop band Space. He was classically trained as a pianist at the Paris Conservatoire, but recorded his first album as a singer in 1975. Space was formed by Marouani in 1977, after he decided to focus more on composition. The group's biggest international success came later that year with the singles "Magic Fly," which hit the U.K.'s Top Ten and, to a lesser extent, "Carry on Turn Me On," both of which appeared on charts in a number of countries. Space toured and recorded for the next few years and continued to make well-received records, although no singles duplicated the success of "Magic Fly." After several albums, a rift occurred in the band; 1980's Deeper Zone, recorded under the name of Space, was actually an album by band members Roland Romanelli and Jannick Top, who took over and kept the band name, but went relatively unnoticed…