PARÍS, AÑOS 20

THE CRAZY 20s IN ARRIAGA

This concert brings together an anthology of the best pages of vocal and instrumental chamber music production of the early decades of the 20th century, while at the same time demonstrating the close coexistence and mutual admiration between the composers, sometimes creators, other times dedicatees. Paris was then the European hub for plastic arts as well as for literature and music. Composers, writers and painters of different nationalities met in the French capital to nourish themselves on the avant-garde, to pool their talents and to promote new creations. The works on display in the programme provide ample evidence of the friendship and collaboration between Ravel, Stravinsky, Falla and Poulenc, successors of Satie, Debussy and Fauré, and who, in turn, preceded gifted disciples, such as Delage, who dedicated successive compositions to his masters.

The thematic and structural features that form the mainstay of this programme are the arrangements of the chamber songs, on this occasion with instrumental accompaniment of small ensembles that provide a rich, novel and intimate colour, all combined with a taste for exoticism in such evocative pieces as the Quatre Poèmes Hindous, faithful debtor of the Trois Poèmes de Stéphane Mallarmé, which transport us to the Far East. And later, to the African continent, through three exotic art songs by Ravel, the Chansons Madécasses, and the jocular Rapsodie Négre, the work of a young and humorous Poulenc. At his side, Manuel de Falla, so appreciated by this Gallic generation, composed the exquisite Psyché, based on Greek mythology which he skilfully transposed to the no less exotic Alhambra; a brief musical jewel with its French impressionist atmosphere, from which he drew his inspiration during his time in Paris. All of them, pages that rarely appear in programmes, are moments of indubitable pleasure because they are the fruit of their composers’ best inspiration.

Music, like all performing disciplines, reflects the abrupt social changes brought about by crises which, paradoxically, always generate years of artistic fecundity, as happened in the 1920s, after the end of the First World War.

Note: Excerpt and adaptation of a text signed by Alejandro Arnaiz.

SCHEDULE

Download here the recital texts

MANUEL DE FALLA
Psyché (a Mme. Louise Alvar )
Voz, flauta, arpa, violín, viola y violoncello.

MAURICE RAVEL
Chansons Madécasses (a Elizabeth Sprague Coolidge)
Nahandove
Aoua
Il est doux
Voz, flauta, violoncello, piano.

MAURICE RAVEL
Introduction et Allegro
Introduction. Très lent – Allegro (a Albert Blondel)
Solo: arpa
Ensemble: flauta, clarinete, violín I, violín II, viola y violoncello.

MAURICE DELAGE
Quatre Poèmes hindous
Madras (a Maurice Ravel)
Lahore .
Bénarès (a Florent Schmitt)
Jeypur (a Igor Stravinsky)
Voz, flautas (piccolo), oboes (corno inglés), clarinetes (clarinete basso), arpa, violín I, violín II, viola y violoncello.

FRANCIS POULENC
Rapsodie Nègre (a Erik Satie)
Prélude
Ronde
Honoloulou
Pastorale
Final
Voz, flauta, clarinete, violín I, violín II, viola, violoncello, piano.