RAVEL conducts his Bolero and other French Composers Conduct = RAVEL: Bolero; TOMASI: Tam-Tam; La Chanson des sables; SCHMITT: La Tragedie de Salome, Op. 50; GAUBERT: Les Chants de la Mer – Orchestre de l’Association des Concerts Lamoureux/Maurice Ravel/Grand Orchestre Symphonique and Chorus/Henri Tomasi/Orchestre Symphonique de Paris/Philippe Gaubert/Orchestre des Concerts Walther Straram/Florent Schmitt
Dutton CDBP 9789, 75:00 [Distr. by Harmonia mundi] ****:
For the “authenticity” collector, Dutton has assembled four French works led by their composer-conductors, recorded 1930-1935. The first piece, Henri Tomasi’s 1931 Tam-Tam (rec. 3 June 1935) refers to the speaking drums of Africa, particularly in the area around the Ubangi River of what once was French Equitorial Africa and Chad. Marseilles-born Tomasi (1901-1971) had been a conductor of the French National Radio’s colonial network, and he occupied himself with “ethnic” musical sounds. The eight-minute Tam-Tam utilizes a wild chorus, along with percussion pieces like xylophone and sticks, to produce a “King Kong” Hollywood effect, and we half expect actor Noble Johnson to dance before us. A soprano solo intones The Song of the Sands, another “exotic” in recurrent, sultry rhythms. The percussive, ritual atmosphere increases in intensity, the choreography calling upon the chanting natives to toss the Colonial administrators to the crocodiles. A hothouse calm returns, a sweaty violin among pulsing harmonies; and the night, the solitude, and the jungle close over us in the manner of a painting by Henri Rousseau.
Composer Florent Schmitt (1870-1958) won the Prix de Rome in 1900, and his travels colored his imagination with the exotic materials for his ballet La Tragedie de Salome (1889; revised 1907 and 1911). The recording (18-19 April 1930) captures the post-Romantic imagery of a symphonic poem whose pictorial qualities (by Soudeikine, for Diaghilev) derived from the work of Aubrey Beardlsey. A huge Prelude sets the lush, extravagant tone of Herod’s palace in the five-section work, the recording unfortunately marred by acetate wear and scuffing. The Danse des perles, with harp and supercharged string and wind effects, has Salome rifling through jewelry while she dances seductively or militantly, as required. The Enchantments of the Sea has nightmarish visions appear to Herod, some of which hint at voluptuous, wild orgies. A comparison of musical means with Debussy’s water-pieces is inevitable. We segue into The Dance of Lightning, in which Herod loses control and seizes Salome’s veils, and her nude body receives a protective cloak from John the Baptist. In a rage, Herod has John executed, only to have Salome dance with the severed head. The low, bass harmonies might have inspired the opening of Ravel’s Piano Concerto for the Left Hand. In an evil, sandstorm apotheosis, the Dance of Fright throws in the orchestral kitchen sink, and the wildness looks to Stravinsky’s Le Sacre du Printemps, which premiered eleven days after Diaghilev gave Salome.
Philippe Gaubert (1879-1941), another Prix de Rome recipient (1905) made his name as both flute player and conductor, recording the Saint-Saens G Minor Concerto with Artur Rubinstein. His three symphonic poems Les Chants de la Mer (1929) Gaubert recorded
3-4 April 1930 in Paris, and the music inevitably warrants comparisons with Debussy’s La Mer. The first section, indeed, pays debts to the Symbolists and their demand for luxuriant color effects, the ocean’s “songs and perfumes.” The writing proves melodically and texturally strong without directly stealing from Debussy’s paint brush. The second movement, La ronde de la falaise makes a wistful, glistening scherzo, with brisk writing for the flutes and strings. The last section, La-bas, tres loin, sur la mer wants to evoke a sailor’s longing for home while contemplating the sunset. Fanfares open the picture and impose themselves, but the prevailing mood remains dark, melancholy, homesick in the repeated harp riffs.
Ravel’s Bolero evolved from Ida Rubinstein’s commission for her ballet troupe‘s performance, 22 November 1928. The piece appeared on a concert program 11 January 1930 under the very forces presented here, recorded two days earlier, 9 January 1930. Ravel the conductor demands a moderate tempo for his mechanical fandango, the wind and brass players enjoying a degree of freedom within the strict rhythmic pulse. The quality of orchestral definition remains sharp, the specific instruments and their choirs languorously accompanied by the side drum, until the one, explosive key change and the glorious finale. Curiously enough, conductor Piero Coppola recorded Bolero one day prior to Ravel, and the composer had been there to approve it.
–Gary Lemco
