Marcel et Son Orchestre Piou Piou Anymore

Michel de Villers made the beautiful evenings of La Rose Rouge before attending the Trois Mailletz with his accomplices Guy Lafitte and André Persiani. Attached to the swing, the saxophonist worked to demonstrate that good music and entertainment were perfectly reconcilable. A point of view shared by Boris Vian, artistic director of Philips discs. His clientele demanding dance records, Boris supervised the recordings. Entrusted to Villers, arranged by Persiani, these big band faces from 1958 and 1959 - we ignore the staff - instrumental adaptations of fashionable themes, still retain all their charm. In 1961, Jean-Christophe Averty produced a Claude Bolling Special Show for television. The show featured the pianist's nonette, a medium formation that sounded like great. In the absence of images, the music testifies to it.

La version de Véronique Gens de La Voix humaine est très attendue ! Cette « tragédie lyrique en un acte » est faite pour elle, son sens du verbe et son intensité dramatique sont au rendez-vous de ce monologue composé par Poulenc en 1958, sur un texte de Jean Cocteau. On est bien loin ici du Poulenc « léger » des années 1920. Cocteau lui fait d’ailleurs le plus beau des compliments : « Cher Francis, tu as fixé, une fois pour toutes, la façon de dire mon texte. » Véronique Gens confie avoir toujours voulu interpréter et enregistrer cette pièce ; c’est maintenant chose faite avec ses complices de l’Orchestre National de Lille et de son directeur musical, Alexandre Bloch. Également présente sur l’album, la Sinfonietta, qui est en fait une véritable symphonie, mais, comme l’écrit Nicolas Southon, « il est indéniable que l’œuvre – commandée par la BBC à Poulenc en 1947 - possède une fraîcheur et une liberté de ton qui justifient son titre ».

The goal of this recording is to celebrate French music through its past: its antique dances, its pastoral ambiences, its atmospheres of legend… starting with a homage to François Couperin. Often considered as the very quintessence of French musical art, this very great composer and harpsichordist succeeded in charming musicians from all times and places, even far removed from his personal universe. We know, for example, that Brahms held him in high esteem. Nearer to our own time, Hendrik Andriessen (1982-1981) – a major figure in Dutch music – borrowed a lovely melody from our composer (from La Basque, in the Second Book of Harpsichord Pieces), as the theme for a set of variations composed in 1944. Led by a tender and agile flute, accompanied by a harp and strings, the work discreetly evokes the rhythms of the antique dances (the Sicilienne, the Chaconne, the Gavotte…) and also contains a ‘scholastic’ fugato; other more lyrical or meditative moments confer an intensity and even a nobility of expression on these charming ‘concert variations’ that make one regret the little reaction that Andriessen's music has suscitated outside of his own country.

This Albert Roussel disc couples the Second Symphony with one of the composer's most popular pieces, the complete ballet music for Bacchus et Ariane. It is the first in a cycle of three releases featuring the four symphonies and two ballets by the French composer, performed by the Orchestre de Paris and Christoph Eschenbach.

At long last, Jean Martinon's classic EMI Debussy and Ravel cycles from the 1970s have been gathered in a space-saving box set. If you love this repertoire, you'll gasp with joy at the conductor's crystal-clear orchestral balances, which truly reproduce what you see in the printed music. If you respond to a lean, sinewy approach to this repertoire in the manner of Toscanini and Boulez, but pine for the timbral characteristics that used to distinguish French orchestras (silver-coated strings, tart woodwinds, and slightly watery brass) in gorgeous, vibrant sonics, Martinon's your man. Aldo Ciccolini's crisp, diamond-edged finger work stands out in Ravel's two piano concertos and in Debussy's rarely heard Fantasie. The young Itzhak Perlman's dazzling, effortless traversal of Ravel's Tzigane will humble many an aspiring fiddler. And you won't find a more sparkling, translucent Ravel Mother Goose Suite on record. Martinon was a marvel, and a sadly underrated podium giant.

–Jed Distler

Django Reinhardt - Intégrale - La Collection Complète (1928-1953) {20 vols - 40CD - Fremeaux & Associes rel 1996-2005}
EAC rip (secure mode) | FLAC (tracks)+CUE+LOG -> 8.28 Gb
Full Artwork @ 600 dpi (jpg) -> 1.32 Gb | 5% repair rar
© 1928-1953, 1996-2005 Frémeaux & Associés | FA 301 ~ FA 323
Jazz / Continental Jazz / Swing / Gypsy / Guitar

Set of Fremeaux’s definitive Integrale Django Reinhardt collection. Mastered by Daniel Nevers, there are 20 volumes of these, and each volume has 2 CDs – 40 CDs total. Each volume also comes with a fairly thick booklet with discography and notes. And the booklets and inserts have very nice B&W pictures of Django. Une réédition d’exception ! Depuis quelques années maintenant, les éditions Frémeaux ont entrepris la publication d’une intégrale des enregistrements de Django Reinhardt.