Reynaldo (Hahn's) jet d'eau

[pjme]

REYNALDO HAHN : L'île du rêve, 1898. 1 LIVRE DISQUE, 1 cd, 127 pages. Enregistrement réalisé au Prinzregententheater, Munich, les 24 et 26 janvier 2020.

The French press is happy to have this work in good sound. Alas, not all the singers get favorable comments..
http://www.classiquenews.com/cd-evenement-reynaldo-hahn-lile-du-reve-dubois-sargsyan-niquet-2020-1-cd-opera-francais-pal-bru-zane/

"L'Île du rêve condenses into an hour of music all the charms of French Romantic opera. The youthful Reynaldo Hahn – just seventeen at the time – reveals colouristic talents inherited from Bizet, a prosodic originality anticipating Debussy, and above all the passionate outpourings he learnt from his teacher Jules Massenet. On reading through the score of L'Île du rêve, Massenet told Hahn: 'To have written that, you must be a poet.' The plot recounts a French naval officer's love affair with a young Polynesian girl he is forced to abandon. This subject – also treated musically by Puccini (Madama Butterfly) and Delibes (Lakmé) – is approached in an almost Symbolist style: the Romanticism of the music contrasts with a contemplative, introspective treatment of the narration."

You can hear a teaser at:
https://bru-zane.com/en/pubblicazione/lile-du-reve/

[ritter]

Cross-posted from the New Releases thread:

A new recording of chamber music by Reynaldo Hahn (the two String Quartets, and the Romance in A major for violin and piano):



This is the link to Amazon France.

The artists and the label are unknown to me. The CD is released "with the support of the Palazzetto Bru Zane".

Release date is October 23rd.

[kyjo]

I'll have to investigate his SQs. I can't emphasize enough what a great work his Piano Quintet is! Truly first-rate stuff. I also greatly enjoy his Violin Concerto and Sonata.

[Florestan]

I'll have to investigate his SQs. I can't emphasize enough what a great work his Piano Quintet is! Truly first-rate stuff. I also greatly enjoy his Violin Concerto and Sonata.

Don't forget Le rossignol eperdu, 4 books of charming piano pieces.

[ritter]

I'll have to investigate his SQs. I can't emphasize enough what a great work his Piano Quintet is! Truly first-rate stuff. I also greatly enjoy his Violin Concerto and Sonata.

IMHO, the two SQs are Reynaldo at his very best (especially SQ No. 2). They have a nostalgic grace, a  certain calssical purity, whcih makes them disarming to me, and they are far removed from the salon-music quasi-kitsch atmosphere that e.g. some of the piano pieces almost (but not quite) inhabit.

Do give the SQs a try.

[Florestan]

IMHO, the two SQs are Reynaldo at his very best (especially SQ No. 2). They have a nostalgic grace, a  certain calssical purity, whcih makes them disarming to me,

In short, they are Mozartian. 

and they are far removed from the salon-music quasi-kitsch atmosphere that e.g. some of the piano pieces almost (but not quite) inhabit.

If I were a musicologist-cum-cultural-historian the first book I'd write were titled In Praise of Salon Music: From Mozart to Rachmaninoff. This best seller mops the floor with any preconceived notions about salon music being kitschy and shallow. 

Muy buenas tardes, Rafael. Tienes correos, desde algunos dias.

[ritter]

A major new biography of Reynaldo Hahn will be released next week by Fayard (the French publishing house with a most impressive series of books on music):



The author, Philippe Blay, is widely considered as the leading living authority on Hahn. He's already published to books on the composer: Marcel Proust et Reynaldo Hahn - une creation à quatre mains and—as editor— Reynaldo Hahn: un eclectique en musique (the latter being probably the most important addition to the bibliography on Hahn of recent years).

[Stürmisch Bewegt]

Thanks for alerting us to that biography, ritter.  Most interesting.  I love his mélodies, though I find them best appreciated in small batches, amuse-bouches, if you will.  And of course his Ciboulette, which is both witty and endearing as well as loads of fun, worthy of any music fan's attention. 

[ritter]

Cross-posted from the opera sub-forum:

Revisiting Reynaldo Hahn's Le marchand de Venise, while reading the chapter dedicated to this work in Philippe Blay's biography of the composer.


This is the only recording of the work circulating on CD, made live in 1978 at the Salle Favart with the forces of the Paris Opéra (where the work was first performed in 1935). It's conducted by Manuel Rosenthal, and has  Michèle Command, Annick Dutertre, Éliane Lublin, Christian Pouliac, Armand Arabian, Marc Vento, Léonard Pezzino, Tibère Raffali et al. as soloists. The sound of the broadcast (only available from "private"  sources) is perfectly acceptable.

What a lovely and peculiar work this is! It takes the focus away from Shylock's tragedy, and instead puts the love stories of the three couples at the centre. All this in Mozartian structure (a sort of The Rake's Progress avant la lettre?), but with Hahn's hyper-conservative, yet simultaneously highly personal, musical style (and great melodic invention). The work clearly places the singing in the forefront (no symphonic music drama this), but the discreet orchestral tapestry is very effective and delicately scored.

Interesting to read (in Blay's book) the reactions of critics at the time of the premiere, ranging from "absolute masterpiece" to "boring, boring, boring" and "a bloated operetta". I personally love the piece and, particularly, some of its set numbers (the quartet "L'amour, qui pourtant n'est pas bête" and the closing, Don Giovanni-like septet "Car il faut, que l'amour ait le dernier mot") and it certainly is Hahn's magnum opus. A work that deserves wider circulation, and should receive a modern, studio recording (Bru Zane, are you there?  ).

[ritter]

Pianist Shani Diluka will release a Proust-themed album in late October, with an eclectic program, the centrepiece of which is a new recording of Hahn's Piano Concerto, with the Orchestre de Chambre de Paris conducted  by Hervé Niquet:


The fact the Hahn's concerto was composed almost a decade after Proust's death IMHO does not detract interest from this release, particularly since we get a new recording of the rather beautiful concerto.

[ritter]

Impressions — after a first hearing— of this new recording of Hahn's Piano Concerto (cross-posted from the WAYLTN thread):

First listen to this intelligently programmed CD, inspired in the world of Marcel Proust:



First and foremost: the hitherto unknown to me Shani Diluka is a superb pianist. Her phrasing, clarity of tone, and nuanced handling of dynamics are quite extraordinary. First, and I mean really first, rate!

We start with the Piano Concerto of Reynaldo Hahn, a person very close to Proust throughout his life (even if Proust could not have known this piece, as it was composed after his death). Diluka is excellent as the soloist, capturing the nostalgic mood of this music perfectly. Unfortunately, Hervé Niquet's conducting is not entirely to my liking: tempi that feel slow (even if the timings do not differ much from those of alternative recordings) and, particularly, a lack of "snap" and playfulness when the music livens up (e.g. in the march-like second theme of the first movement). In any case, it's good to have a new recording of this charming concerto, and even more so with such a great soloist.

We then get Debussy's early Rêverie, not among my favourite pieces by the composer, but beautifully played here (as is a more languorous than usual L'Isle joyeuse near the end of the disc). A Hahn trifle, Ninette, goes by almost unnoticed, but Wilhelm Kempff's arrangement of Gluck's Orpheus' Lament is quite wonderful. Nathalie Dessay sings Fauré's Au bord de l'eau really touchingly (she later does Le Secret).

Some more Fauré (the Romance sans paroles No. 3 and Les berceaux arranged by Diluka for solo piano) is also very good, as are the Prélude from Franck's opus 18 (I found this surprisingly enjoyable), a Nocturno by Richard Strauss (billed as a world première recording) and Wagner's Elegie (one of the better of the composer's not too significant or representative piano works). At the end, we get actor Guillaume Gallienne reading the famous madeleine episode from Du côté de chez Swann, with another, more substantial and enjoyable Hahn miniature (Les Rêveries du Prince Églantine from Le Rossignol Éperdu) as a backdrop. It works beautifully (actually almost brought me to tears — what a text!).

What doesn't work that well IMHO is a concocted "Sonate de Vinteuil" for violin and piano, which uses the Hahn Nocturne as its first movement, a quite terrible Ysaÿe Mazurka as the second, and a bland Sérénade Espagnole by Chaminade as its finale. Here we're really in salon music territory, and it's played as such (with an adequate thin tone) by Pierre Fourchenneret. And, of course, the mystery of the "petite phrase" remains unsolved. 

Despite the not so fantastic orchestral accompaniment of the concerto, and the failed recreation of the fictional "Sonate de Vinteuil", this generous (81') CD is very enjoyable, and the playing of Mme. Diluka is simply wonderful.

[ritter]

Michael Cookson reviews —very favourably— Shani Diluka's 'The Proust Album" for MusicWeb International. Read here.

[Mirror Image]

Michael Cookson reviews —very favourably— Shani Diluka's 'The Proust Album" for MusicWeb International. Read here.

Nice, Rafael. I just bought this recording even though I already had this one in my collection (coupled with the Violin Concerto):

[ritter]

A new release (it appeared at the beginning of this month) that can be very interesting, given the artists involved.



Christiane Karg (a wonderful soprano, whose recording of Ravel's Shéhérazade conducted by David Afkham is excellent IMHO), the Bavarian Radio Chorus, and pianist Gerold Huber (best known for his work with Christian Gerhaher -- they form one superb duo in the lieder repertoire!), give us Reynaldo Hahn's complete Études latines (all ten songs, including the three with choral accompaniment and minor solo contributions--which were omitted from Tassis Christoyannis' traversal for Bru Zane). AFAIK, the complete set has only been recorded twice before: on the Hyperion set of Hahn mélodies with pianist Graham Johnson (Ian Bostridge and Stephen Varcoe alternate in the songs), and by baritone Didier Henry on the Maguelone label.

We also get some Debussy works on the CD, the main ne being the piano version of La Damoiselle élue (which should suit Mrs. Karg's voice and artistry very well).

[Mirror Image]

A new release (it appeared at the beginning of this month) that can be very interesting, given the artists involved.



Christiane Karg (a wonderful soprano, whose recording of Ravel's Shéhérazade conducted by David Afkham is excellent IMHO), the Bavarian Radio Chorus, and pianist Gerold Huber (best known for his work with Christian Gerhaher -- they form one superb duo in the lieder repertoire!), give us Reynaldo Hahn's complete Études latines (all ten songs, including the three with choral accompaniment and minor solo contributions--which were omitted from Tassis Christoyannis' traversal for Bru Zane). AFAIK, the complete set has only been recorded twice before: on the Hyperion set of Hahn mélodies with pianist Graham Johnson (Ian Bostridge and Stephen Varcoe alternate in the songs), and by baritone Didier Henry on the Maguelone label.

We also get some Debussy works on the CD, the main ne being the piano version of La Damoiselle élue (which should suit Mrs. Karg's voice and artistry very well).

Looks like a nice looking recording. I was certainly considering it when I bought some Hahn recordings the other night. The piano version of La Damoiselle élue is exquisite, but I have several great recordings of it already.

[Florestan]

A new release (it appeared at the beginning of this month) that can be very interesting, given the artists involved.



Christiane Karg (a wonderful soprano, whose recording of Ravel's Shéhérazade conducted by David Afkham is excellent IMHO), the Bavarian Radio Chorus, and pianist Gerold Huber (best known for his work with Christian Gerhaher -- they form one superb duo in the lieder repertoire!), give us Reynaldo Hahn's complete Études latines (all ten songs, including the three with choral accompaniment and minor solo contributions--which were omitted from Tassis Christoyannis' traversal for Bru Zane). AFAIK, the complete set has only been recorded twice before: on the Hyperion set of Hahn mélodies with pianist Graham Johnson (Ian Bostridge and Stephen Varcoe alternate in the songs), and by baritone Didier Henry on the Maguelone label.

We also get some Debussy works on the CD, the main ne being the piano version of La Damoiselle élue (which should suit Mrs. Karg's voice and artistry very well).

Many thanks for this most interesting tip, Rafael.

[ritter]

Cross-posted from the WAYLTN thread.

....

Some piano music [...] this afternoon, with this recent acquisition (first listen):



Pavel Kolesnikov's recently released recital of piano music by Reynaldo Hahn (selections from Le Rossignol éperdu and from the Premières valses) has received almost unanimous accolades and (from what I've listened to so far —I'm halfway through the disc) they are fully justified. Kolesnikov plays with elegance, expressiveness, and sensitivity, but without sentimentality. The tempi are generally slower than the ones those familiar with these pieces are used to, and the music gains in weight and substance as a result. The selection of pieces is also very intelligently made, with nine extracts from Le Rossignol followed by six of the waltzes. The CD the concludes with another 10 pieces from Le Rossignol.

I must admit I'm not that keen on the waltzes as compositions (perhaps with the exception with the most substantial one (at 4' plus), Sans rigueur, but they are well played. But the pieces from Le Rossignol make a very coherent cycle, with each one nevertheless having its own "flavour ", and the pianist makes the most out of them individually and in context.

The end effect is to these ears the most satisfying all-Hahn piano CD I've encountered (and I have a very extensive collection of CDs of Reynaldo's music). Highly recommended!

[Mandryka]

Can someone help me out? I'm looking for the tracklist to Hahn's own recordings of his songs, the double CD. I have the recordings, but never tagged them.

[MusicTurner]

Lists for the Romophone 3CD box can be found on the web (CD 82015-2, from 2000), but you seem to mean a 2 CD set

https://www.naxos.com/CatalogueDetail/?id=82015-2
https://reynaldo-h50ahn.net/Html/discographie.htm

A French site says that there are a couple of errors in that list of content, however.

[Mandryka]

What I have is 13 tracks tagged "Reynaldo Hahn sings Reynaldo Hahn" - I vaguely remember it was Romophone.