Soprano en Feu

28th December 2012 marks the 75th Anniversary of the death of Maurice Ravel, the great French composer, best-known for his beautiful melodies, orchestral & instrumental textures and mesmeric compositional effects.
Many consumers will know Ravel through his masterpieces, such as: Boléro, Pavane pour une infant défunte, Rapsodie espagnole, Gaspard de la nuit, Ma Mère l’oye, Daphnis et Chloë, Le Tombeau de Couperin and La Valse.

This 18-CD set offers a comprehensive overview of Messiaen’s work in recordings made between 1963 and 2000 by the Warner labels Erato and Teldec. The performers include the composer himself, his wife the pianist Yvonne Loriod, Pierre Boulez, Marie-Claire Alain and other champions of Messiaen’s work.
As a tantalising and unique bonus, a full CD is devoted to an extensive interview with Messiaen recorded in 1988 in which he speaks, in French, about bird-song, colour, travel, religious faith, opera and the avant-garde. The richly illustrated 149-page booklet includes a full English translation of the interview as well as the composer’s detailed commentary about most of the works included in the set – with booklet editor Fabian Watkinson supplying information about the remaining works.

This 18-CD set offers a comprehensive overview of Messiaen’s work in recordings made between 1963 and 2000 by the Warner labels Erato and Teldec. The performers include the composer himself, his wife the pianist Yvonne Loriod, Pierre Boulez, Marie-Claire Alain and other champions of Messiaen’s work.
As a tantalising and unique bonus, a full CD is devoted to an extensive interview with Messiaen recorded in 1988 in which he speaks, in French, about bird-song, colour, travel, religious faith, opera and the avant-garde. The richly illustrated 149-page booklet includes a full English translation of the interview as well as the composer’s detailed commentary about most of the works included in the set – with booklet editor Fabian Watkinson supplying information about the remaining works.

This 18-CD set offers a comprehensive overview of Messiaen’s work in recordings made between 1963 and 2000 by the Warner labels Erato and Teldec. The performers include the composer himself, his wife the pianist Yvonne Loriod, Pierre Boulez, Marie-Claire Alain and other champions of Messiaen’s work.
As a tantalising and unique bonus, a full CD is devoted to an extensive interview with Messiaen recorded in 1988 in which he speaks, in French, about bird-song, colour, travel, religious faith, opera and the avant-garde. The richly illustrated 149-page booklet includes a full English translation of the interview as well as the composer’s detailed commentary about most of the works included in the set – with booklet editor Fabian Watkinson supplying information about the remaining works.

This 18-CD set offers a comprehensive overview of Messiaen’s work in recordings made between 1963 and 2000 by the Warner labels Erato and Teldec. The performers include the composer himself, his wife the pianist Yvonne Loriod, Pierre Boulez, Marie-Claire Alain and other champions of Messiaen’s work.
As a tantalising and unique bonus, a full CD is devoted to an extensive interview with Messiaen recorded in 1988 in which he speaks, in French, about bird-song, colour, travel, religious faith, opera and the avant-garde. The richly illustrated 149-page booklet includes a full English translation of the interview as well as the composer’s detailed commentary about most of the works included in the set – with booklet editor Fabian Watkinson supplying information about the remaining works.

Achille-Claude Debussy (22 August 1862 – 25 March 1918) was a French composer. Alongside Maurice Ravel he was one of the most prominent figures associated with Impressionist music, although Debussy disliked the term when applied to his compositions. He was made Chevalier of the Legion of Honour in 1903. He was among the most influential composers of the late 19th and early 20th centuries, and his use of non-traditional scales and chromaticism influenced many composers who followed. Debussy's music is noted for its sensory content and frequent use of nontraditional tonalities. The prominent French literary style of his period was known as Symbolism, and this movement directly inspired Debussy both as a composer and as an active cultural participant.

French love songs from three centuries, interspersed with reflective lute solos, constitute an Idylle for mezzo-soprano Lea Desandre and lutenist Thomas Dunford. As they explain: “The emotions of love are explored in different forms – languor, desire, fascination, happiness.” The word ‘idyll’, evoking a blissful, tranquil experience, derives from Ancient Greece and poetry on a pastoral theme. Desandre and Dunford spin a thematic and musical thread between eras and styles, starting with a sequence of 10 airs de cour from the 17th century. Spanning the era from the 1860s to the 1920s are arias and songs by Offenbach, Debussy, Hahn and Messager, and the album then fast-forwards to the 1960s and two iconic French chanteuses, Barbara and Françoise Hardy. Dunford supplies instrumental interludes in the form of two dances by Robert de Visée, a court musician for both Louis XIV and Louis XV, and Erik Satie’s Gymnopédie No 1 and Gnossienne No 1.