Servantes

Quel est le secret des soeurs-servantes de Saint-Michel ?…

Quel est le secret des soeurs-servantes de Saint-Michel ?…

1209, sud-ouest de la France. Chargés de la croisade contre l'hérésie cathare, les dominicains poursuivent dans l'ombre un autre objectif : en finir avec une société secrète, les soeurs-servantes de Saint-Michel, dépositaire de reliques datant des premières heures du christianisme. …

I believe that great art is often the product of great difficulty and tribulation, in many cases for the artist themselves. I also think art borne out of a time of societal turmoil can be even more profound, and can shed light today on what it was like to live and endure through tragedies of the past.

Most of the secular choral works of Francis Poulenc have enjoyed respectable treatment on disc–but not for awhile. This newcomer not only is equal to the best in the catalog, but it contains all of Poulenc’s a cappella compositions in the genre, including the infrequently heard Petites voix. Although the masterpiece Figure humaine, written in 1943 during the Nazi occupation of France, is the big work here–and it’s performed with spectacularly vivid ensemble clarity and all the poignancy that Poulenc must have intended with his very deliberate use of vocal timbre and expressive means–the generous program reminds us also of the merits of the composer’s „lighter“ works, particularly the Chansons françaises of 1945/46, Chanson à boire, for male choir, and Petites voix (1936), for treble voices.

Fifty years after his death, Poulenc is one of the most frequently performed French composers of the twentieth century all over the world. His choral output offers a nuanced portrait of a musician who, at bottom, fell in love with the texts he set, whether they were sacred (CD 1) or secular (CD 2). ʻA singer, as fashioned by Francis, presents us with words raised to the height of severity or charm by Poulenc’s musical intelligence’, wrote Jean Cocteau. An admirable compliment to an oeuvre as capable of expressing faith (Motets pour un temps de pénitence) as resistance.

A few of these small choral gems are well known to amateur choirs, and Poulenc's secular choral pieces are more often presented one at a time on choral albums than in the groupings in which they were originally included. Francis Poulenc: Secular Choral Music offers the composer's very first choral piece, the Chanson à boire for men's voices (1922), but most of the music here dates from either the late '30s (the Petites voix, for female or children's voices, and Sept chansons) or the World War II era (Un soir de neige), the folk-song settings entitled Chansons françaises, and the ambitious Figure humaine, whose final number, "Liberté," was dropped in sheet music form over French cities by Britain's Royal Air Force. Someone once described Poulenc as "part monk, part hooligan," and these a cappella choral works give evidence of both tendencies. The Chansons françaises are cheerful pieces with just a shade of extended harmony, almost French counterparts to Bartók's folk song settings, while the more serious pieces, such as "Un chien perdu" (A Lost Dog), from the Petites voix, have a mystical tinge that links them strongly with Poulenc's better-known sacred choral music.