Saint Charbel

A welcome addition to the catalog of Saint-Saëns' chamber music, this disc presents four of his pieces for violin and piano in a balanced and satisfying program. Violinist Ulf Wallin and pianist Roland Pöntinen have a sympathetic feeling for Saint-Saëns that shines through their polished performances, particularly in the two sonatas – works of such interest and vitality that it is inexplicable that they are infrequently performed and recorded. In its pensive lyricism and effervescent virtuosity, the Violin Sonata No. 1 shows the influences of Brahms and Mendelssohn. Wallin gives full bow to the long, noble melodies in the first two movements, and delivers the brilliant scherzo and finale with verve.

In a way, it is quite sensational to see another Morbid Saint album released at this point in time, meaning more than 30 years after their second LP “Destruction System” was recorded but not finished, only to be officially published recently. However, the prospect of delivering new music in their own unique death/thrash metal style was one of the main reasons why the core members reunited in 2010 in the first place. During its initial run from 1984 to ’94, the band wasn’t even close to having the final word, especially with regards to their seminal first record “Spectrum of Death” (1990). “Swallowed By Hell” was born from a remote creative exchange, with ideas being bounced back and forth between all members to create a ten-track barrage of extreme metal like it’s become rare these days - utterly punishing yet musically sophisticated, pushing limits but not for its own sake…

The two string quartets of Camille Saint-Saëns are not among the deathless masterpieces in the genre, but they offer enough entertaining and agreeable music to be regarded as minor classics of chamber music. The String Quartet in E minor, Op. 112, and the String Quartet No. 2 in G major, Op. 153, share the craftsmanship, intellectual rigor, and tastefulness that are characteristic of Saint-Saëns' conservative style.

Saint-Saëns's chamber music broke new ground in France at a time when public taste tended to favour opera and opéra-comique. His first Sonata for violin and piano, one of the earliest composed in France, is a masterpiece of boundless beauty. Its emotional impact and its highly poetic content are served by the composer’s perfect mastery of formal architecture. (It has also been proposed as the model for the ‘Vinteuil Sonata’ which runs through Marcel Proust's novel cycle ‘In Search of Lost Time’.) The second Sonata, composed in Egypt, is very different from its predecessor: more serious, classical, and intimate. While the writing is more melodic, the composer prophesied that the sonata would not be understood “until the eighth hearing”.

Saint-Saens’s Etudes offer an intricate and scintillating panoply of the French school of technique (the basis and prophecy of what Jean-Philippe Collard so mischievously called Marguerite Long’s ‘diggy-diggy-dee’ school of piano playing). Yet as Piers Lane tells us in his alternately wry and delightful accompanying essay (obligatory reading for all lovers of French pianism), they can be as evocative (‘Les cloches de las Palmas’) as they are finger-twisting (‘En forme de valse’, to name but one). The left-hand Etudes, too, given their self-imposed limitation, are a fragile and poetic surprise. In other words Saint-Saens’s Etudes are more comprehensive than their equivalents by, say, Moszkowski or Lazare Levey (superbly recorded by Ilana Vered on Connoisseur Society and Danielle Laval on French EMI, respectively – neither issued in the UK).

French composer and pianist Camille Saint-Saens (1835-1921) wrote five symphonies; however, only one of them, the Third “Organ” Symphony, became at all popular. Even so, its popularity is so immense, it doesn’t matter that the others have found relatively little favor. They’re still interesting, but quite overshadowed by their big brother. It’s good to have them all together in one package if for no other reason than curiosity’s sake. Who knows; a person familiar only with the Third might soon find a new favorite among the others.

This was the first commercially produced SACD hybrid super audio on the market. In June of 2000, I sat in one room recording in pcm and the research team of Philips were in the room next door taking my analogue signal directly from my mixer. I first released my pcm version in the fall of 2000. The Pyramix at that time was very primitive but thanks to the Phliips team who worked around the clock to produce the software, we were able to get this DSD version out at the beginning of 2001.