Albert Roussel: Symphonies No. 2, Op. 23 & No. 4, Op. 53 [1987]

2014-04-22T15:59:32Z

Albert Roussel: Symphonies No. 2, Op. 23 & No. 4, Op. 53 [1987]


1	Symphony No. 2, Op. 23 In B Flat Major: Lent			
2	Symphony No. 2, Op. 23 In B Flat Major: Modere			
3	Symphony No. 2, Op. 23 In B Flat Major: Tres lent			
4	Symphony No. 4, Op. 53 In A Major: Lento			
5	Symphony No. 4, Op. 53 In A Major: Lento molto			
6	Symphony No. 4, Op. 53 In A Major: Allegro Scherzando			
7	Symphony No. 4, Op. 53 In A Major: Allegro molto

Orchestre National de France
Charles Dutoit – conductor

Symphony No. 2 in B flat major, Op. 23 is a grand and brooding symphony whose tone is mostly one of striving. It is in three movements, each of which includes fast and slow music.

The first movement starts out slowly, gets faster, then slows down again. The densely-colored introduction introduces a tonal conflict between D major and the title key, B-flat. Eventually violins come in with the first theme of the fast part, which is later taken up by flute and oboe. Both the theme and its accompaniment are nervous and insistent. Horns and violas announce the more sunny and optimistic second theme, after which both themes are worked over in an atmosphere of striving and conflict. Material from the introduction intercedes, as if to halt progress, and things slow down on the way to the conclusion, which, like the introduction, is in B-flat and D.

The second movement starts out fast, with woodwinds prominent. Shortly after the beginning the violins give out a gamboling theme over piquant harmonies and colors. Sometimes the gamboling becomes heavy-footed, informed by Roussel's characteristic gruffness. The coloristic felicities are too numerous to mention, although a high clarinet line over lusty horn parts seems noteworthy. The middle section is slower, and more reflective. A tad disturbed at first, it eventually works up to the striving mood of the first movement. The first part abrubtly dismisses the concerns of the middle section when it returns in a varied recapitulation.

The third movement starts out slowly, and returns to the striving tone and thematic materials of the first movement. The harmony eventually stabilizes into B-flat, resolving the tonal conflict if not the dramatic one. We may not be victorious, but we are at rest. ---Aaron Rabushka, Rovi

Written by the sick and tired 65-year-old composer in a single three-and-a-half-month period in the fall of 1934, Albert Roussel's Symphony No. 4 was nevertheless one of the most vigorous and optimistic symphonic works of the 1935 season. Written in the traditional four movements and in the conservative harmonic language of la belle époque expressed in the severe counterpoint of the Schola Cantorium, Roussel's Fourth is still an extremely powerful and affecting work imbued with sincerity, strength, nobility, and a very, very dry wit. After a radiantly glowering Lento introduction, the opening Allegro con brio in sonata form never varies its pulse as it builds to an abrupt coda. The Lento molto may be the most expressive music Roussel ever wrote, solemn but emotionally searing music of uncommon power and sincerity. The Allegro scherzando is a muscular jig with just the slightest trace of irony. The closing Allegro molto is also in sonata form, but a sonata form permeated by a concentrated wit and a joyful counterpoint culminating in a magnificent coda. ---James Leonard, Rovi

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Roussel - Symphonies No. 1 Op.7, 'Le poème de la forêt' & No.3 in G minor Op.42 (Dutoit) [1987]

2011-08-11T12:58:39Z

Roussel - Symphonies No. 1 Op.7, 'Le poème de la forêt' & No.3 in G minor Op.42 (Dutoit) [1987]


1 	Roussel : Symphony No.1 Op.7, 'Le poème de la forêt' : I Forêt d'hiver 	
2 	Roussel : Symphony No.1 Op.7, 'Le poème de la forêt' : II Renouveau 	
3 	Roussel : Symphony No.1 Op.7, 'Le poème de la forêt' : III Soir d'été 	
4 	Roussel : Symphony No.1 Op.7, 'Le poème de la forêt' : IV Faunes et Dryades
5 	Roussel : Symphony No.3 in G minor Op.42 : I Allegro vivo 
6 	Roussel : Symphony No.3 in G minor Op.42 : II Adagio 
7 	Roussel : Symphony No.3 in G minor Op.42 : III Scherzo - Vivace 	
8 	Roussel : Symphony No.3 in G minor Op.42 : IV Allegro con spirit

Orchestre National de France
Charles Dutoit – conductor

Forced by ill-health to give up his naval career at 25, Roussel's late start as a composer is well known. Touching the preliminaries with Eugène Gigout, he began studies with Vincent d'Indy in 1898 at the latter's newly founded Schola Cantorum, where he faced a dauntingly thorough course which would occupy him for a decade. D'Indy was quick to recognize ability, appointing Roussel professor of counterpoint in 1902, and acknowledging him as a creative artist. When D'Indy received the symphonic poem Renouveau in 1905, he remarked to Marcel Labey, "Roussel has sent me an utterly delightful orchestral piece that is still in progress; if he weren't so distrustful of himself and could really let himself go, he could do some quite splendid things!" Such lack of confidence is difficult to credit, given the expressive power of works such as Résurrection (1903), a "symphonic prelude" after Tolstoy's novel, or the high finish, originality, surefire verve, and glowing tonal palette of the Divertissement for piano and winds, composed in 1906, as he was engaged with his Symphony No. 1. Nonetheless, the symphony's composition slowly proceeded, and with misgivings. Soir d'été, completed in October 1904, was heard at one of Alfred Cortot's lectures -- "hearings" of works by young composers given at the Nouveau-Théâtre -- on December 15. While Roussel gained some assurance regarding the effectiveness of his orchestral writing, another symphonic movement, Vendanges (Harvest), was rejected and destroyed after performance at the lectures on April 18, 1905. Renouveau was completed in July 1905, and Forêt d'hiver in June 1906. With three movements in hand suggesting the round of the seasons, Roussel joined Forêt d'hiver and Renouveau in a single movement -- the former as an atmospheric introduction, the latter in proper first-movement sonata form. Soir d'été is a ternary adagio showing strong affinities with D'Indy's Jour d'été à la montagne, composed at the same time. Throughout, the orchestral writing is evocative, pictorial, and exquisitely poetic, if not highly original -- Roussel exercising up-to-the-minute craft with a deft touch. Only in the final movement, "Faunes et dryades," completed in September 1906, does one feel Roussel "really let himself go." A rondo, the dance-like and suavely propulsive returning portions enclose reminiscences from previous movements to realize a cyclic design, the Holy Grail of form chez D'Indy and Schola adherents. The work's premiere was given at the Concerts Populaires in Brussels on March 22, 1908, conducted by Sylvain Dupuis. D'Indy led the Paris premiere on February 7, 1909, with the Lamoureux Orchestra. --- Adrian Corleonis, Rovi

At every stage of his career, Roussel's best work is masterly finished, engaging, surefire. But for the connoisseur, tracing his stylistic evolution possesses a fascination of its own. If the opera-ballet Padmåvatî (1914-1918) crowns his second manner, making explicit the preoccupation with instinct and annihilation ironically broached in the ballet Le Festin de l'araignée (1912), his Symphony No. 2 (1919-1920) encapsulates the period with formal yet disturbing point. The ironic detachment of Le Festin gives way to dark (and harmonically adventurous) foreboding, while the irrepressibly animated episodes are fraught with frenzied feverishness. But by the mid-1920s the skies had cleared, so to speak, and Roussel entered his final, neo-Classical, phase with the orchestral Suite in F (1926) whose three movements -- two in Baroque dance forms -- afford a foretaste of the Symphony No. 3 in their effortless combination of energy and serenity. Commissioned by Koussevitzky, conductor of the Boston Symphony Orchestra, the Suite received its premiere by those forces January 21, 1927, continuing a Francophile tradition that had seen Henri Rabaud and Pierre Monteux as chef d'orchestre, and entertained Roussel's teacher and colleague, Vincent d'Indy, in 1905 and 1921.

To celebrate the B.S.O.'s 50th anniversary, Koussevitzky commissioned a number of works including Honegger's Symphony No. 1, Prokofiev's Fourth, Hindemith's Concert Music, Op. 50, Stravinsky's Symphony of Psalms, and Roussel's Symphony No. 3. The Third occupied Roussel from August 1929 through March 1930. Roussel and his wife were present for the Boston premiere, October 24, 1930, the composer remarking that Koussevitzky had conducted "with an extraordinary care and enthusiasm," and noting the day after, "As far as I can gauge after this hearing, it is the best thing I have done...." That, indeed, has been the consensus of critics and listeners alike -- only the ballet Bacchus et Ariane, which followed it immediately, has rivaled it in popularity. From the sardonic strut of the opening, the Third is immediately arresting, while its tightly coiled argument -- compact even for the form-conscious Roussel -- compels by its melding of logic and vivacity, sophistication and primitivism. The second movement transcends counterpoint in a miracle of passionate, ostinato-driven polyphony, while the scherzo and final Allegro con spirito -- elegant and rumbustious by turns -- are wrought with colossal playfulness. Albert Wolff and the Concerts Lamoureux gave the Paris premiere on November 28, 1931, and made a classic recording of the work the following year. --- Adrian Corleonis, Rovi

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