Deshayes

Produced by the Bru-Zane Foundation, whose mission is to aid in the rediscovery of unjustly neglected French music, 1780 to 1920. An album of Romantic French cantatas by Cherubini, Heand Boisselot in the company of an exceptional guide, mezzo-soprano Karine Deshayes, Opera Fuoco and its conductor, David Stern. The French Cantata, a Baroque-era presence, was restored to favor in the 19th century as an alternative to the Italian stage, then generally perceived in France as being overly exuberant.

A grasshopper, a milkmaid’s pail, a shepherd, a fox, a country mouse, a cobbler… These are just some of the diverse and varied characters from the famous Fables that Jacques Offenbach decided to set to music in 1842, some 150 years after they were written by Jean de La Fontaine. With their vivid texts featuring talking animals and stock characters, the Fables offered an allegorical and didactic way of alluding to the court and the mores of the time. Offenbach chose six of the 240 Fables of la Fontaine to set as mélodies. Here the conductor Jean-Pierre Haeck presents them in his own orchestration performed by the Orchestre de l’Opéra de Rouen and the mezzosoprano Karine Deshayes, who excels in this repertory. To complete the programme, the singer performs numbers from Offenbach’s opéra-bouffe Boule-de-neige and the orchestra plays movements from the ballet Le Papillon, offering listeners a recording as refined as it is witty.