Poulenc - La Voix humaine, Sinfonietta
£14.49
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Label: Alpha
Cat No: ALPHA899
Format: CD
Number of Discs: 1
Release Date: 6th January 2023
Contents
Artists
Veronique Gens (soprano)Orchestre National de Lille
Conductor
Alexandre BlochWorks
La Voix humaineSinfonietta
Artists
Veronique Gens (soprano)Orchestre National de Lille
Conductor
Alexandre BlochAbout
Véronique Gens’s version of La Voix humaine has been eagerly awaited! This ‘lyric tragedy in one act’ might have been written for her, so ideally suited are her feeling for language and her dramatic intensity to Poulenc’s monologue on a text by Jean Cocteau, composed in 1958. This is a far cry from the ‘light’ Poulenc of the 1920s. Cocteau paid him the highest compliment: ‘Dear Francis, you have fixed, once and for all, the way to speak my text.’
Véronique Gens confesses that she had always wanted to perform and record this piece; now she has achieved her ambition, in close partnership with the Orchestre National de Lille under its music director Alexandre Bloch. Also featured on the album is the Sinfonietta: this is in fact a genuine symphony, but, as Nicolas Southon writes, ‘there is no denying that the work – commissioned by the BBC in 1947 – has a freshness and a freedom of tone that justify its title’.
Véronique Gens confesses that she had always wanted to perform and record this piece; now she has achieved her ambition, in close partnership with the Orchestre National de Lille under its music director Alexandre Bloch. Also featured on the album is the Sinfonietta: this is in fact a genuine symphony, but, as Nicolas Southon writes, ‘there is no denying that the work – commissioned by the BBC in 1947 – has a freshness and a freedom of tone that justify its title’.
Sound/Video
Paused
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1La Voix humaine : Introduction
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2La Voix humaine : Allô, allô...
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3La Voix humaine : Allô, c’est toi ?
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4La Voix humaine : Hier soir, je me couchée tout de suite
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5La Voix humaine : Allô, chéri... Si on coupe, redemande-moi tout de suite
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6La Voix humaine : Quelle comédie ?
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7La Voix humaine : Souviens-toi du dimanche de Versailles
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8La Voix humaine : Demain ? Je ne savais pas que c’était si rapide
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9La Voix humaine : Allô !... et comme ça ?
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10La Voix humaine : Oh ! non, mon chéri, surtout ne me regarde pas
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11La Voix humaine : Allô, allô, Mademoiselle
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12La Voix humaine : Allô ! ah ! chéri ! c’est toi ?
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13La Voix humaine : Hier soir, j’ai voulu prendre un comprimé
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14La Voix humaine : Il était quatre heures du matin
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15La Voix humaine : Allô ! J’entends de la musique
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16La Voix humaine : Pardone-moi. Je sais que cette scène est intolérable
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17La Voix humaine : Avant hier soir ? J’ai dormi
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18La Voix humaine : Allô ! Allô ! Madame, retirez-vous
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19La Voix humaine : Sois tranquille. On ne suicide pas deux fois
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20La Voix humaine : Allô !... Allô !... Mon Dieu, faites qu’il redemande
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21La Voix humaine : Alors, voilà... Jallais dire machinalement : à tout de suite
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22Sinfonietta, FP141: 1. Allegro con fuoco
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23Sinfonietta, FP141: 2. Molto vivace
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24Sinfonietta, FP141: 3. Andante cantabile
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25Sinfonietta, FP141: 4. Très vite et très gai
Europadisc Review
Recently we gave an enthusiastic review to a new disc of Poulenc’s orchestral music by the late Bramwell Tovey and the BBC Concert Orchestra. Now along comes another Poulenc album, this time of entirely French provenance, which is likely to further delight lovers of this composer’s music. The 1948 Sinfonietta (originally composed to a BBC commission) is common to both recordings, but the main attraction of this new release from the Alpha label is soprano Véronique Gens’s assumption of the role of Elle (‘She’), the sole singer in Poulenc’s one-act ‘tragédie lyrique’ La Voix humaine (1959).
This 45-minute psychological drama, based on a single-character play by Jean Cocteau of 1930, was first performed at Paris’s Théâtre National de l'Opéra-Comique by Poulenc’s muse Denise Duval, and conducted by Georges Prêtre. It is, along with his preceding opera Dialogues des Carmélites (1956), arguably the masterpiece of Poulenc’s late maturity. The orchestra, though a large one when placed against a single voice, is used with marvellous economy, and the action, such as it is – one end of a phone conversation between a distraught, suicidal woman (Elle) and her former lover, with reminiscences of happier times but also numerous telephonic interruptions and crossed lines – places the work closer to post-war music-theatre than is often given credit.
Poulenc worked meticulously on the score to capture the psychological essence of Cocteau’s drama, with extensive passages of recitative-like writing to reflect natural patterns of speech via the highly artificial medium of the telephone. At the same time, the lyrical, often hysterical outbursts highlight moments of passion, frustration and emotional nostalgia, all the more intense for alternating with more prosaic material. Meanwhile, the sparingly used orchestra is the gel that holds the work together, or rather gives the work its musical unity. And Poulenc’s music – motivic and often cellular, rather than conventionally lyrical – fits the demands of the drama perfectly.
There are two main differences between this and the classic Duval/Prêtre recording (still available as part of Warner’s ‘Original Jackets’ series). First is the quality of the sound, which is atmospheric but also superbly detailed, highlighting nuances of orchestration such as vivid use of col legno, harmonics and sul ponticello in the strings that leap out at the listener and bring an extra immediacy to the drama. The Orchestre National de Lille under Alexandre Bloch plays superbly throughout, alert and sensitive in the many pages of supportive and punctuating music, sumptuously radiant in the more sustained, emotionally-charged passages.
The other difference is the singing of Véronique Gens herself. Very different from the soubrettish lightness of Duval, this is an altogether more lyrical take on Poulenc’s vocal writing, less redolent of theatrical greasepaint, not perhaps so quick-witted, but more impassioned and desperate, in touch with the very feelings that made this work so personal to the periodically depressive Poulenc himself. Her French is, of course, immaculate, finely projected, and – more importantly for non-Francophone listeners – splendidly brought to life (the booklet contains the opera’s French text, but no translations). The touching lyricism as the opera works through a final outburst to its stark, lonely conclusion is especially moving.
Among modern recordings of this La Voix humaine, Gens’s account stands head-and-shoulders above others, and for those seeking an audio-only recording in excellent sound, this performance can be confidently recommended. True Poulenc aficionados will want both this and the vintage Duval recording: complementary performances which reveal the true greatness and depth of this captivating and compelling opera.
The Sinfonietta makes a generous coupling, Poulenc here in lighter mood, even though classical the dimensions of the original plan grew to something altogether more expansive. There’s a lightness and fire to the playing that is immediately engaging, but no lack of warmth, and the sensuality of the scoring takes on a very French feel in the hands of Bloch and his Lille musicians. The contrast between the Mendelssohnian Molto vivace second movement and the dreamier, gorgeously inflected Andante cantabile that follows is perfectly pitched without feeling exaggerated, and the closing movement has a liveliness and sparkle reminiscent of Stravinsky in full neoclassical mode. It serves as a perfect palette cleanser after the emotional intensity of La Voix humaine, and makes an ideal conclusion to a marvellous disc.
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