Classical Music | Soprano

Recorded on 11/09/2004, uploaded on 01/15/2009

Musician's or Publisher's Notes

Throughout the 1880s, Fauré’s otherwise cheerful demeanor and child-like mirth was slowly being whittled away. His failed engagement to Marieanne Viardot perhaps brought on the first bouts of melancholy, which were only exacerbated by his struggles to build a career as a composer. In 1890, a prestigious commission for an opera fell apart when Paul Verlaine, in his absinthe-soaked state, was unable to deliver a libretto. Fauré plunged into a deep depression. At the urging of his friends, Fauré left France for a recuperative stay in Venice. There, he was the guest of Winnaretta Singer, the future Princess de Polignac, heiress to the Singer sewing machine fortune, and a great patron of music. Fauré’s spirits soon rebounded and he set to work on setting (somewhat ironically) a handful of Verlaine poems to music. He confessed in a letter to Marguerite Baugnies that his time in the Italian city left him few quiet moments for composing and that he planned to polish and finish the songs once he returned to Paris. And that he did, revising the only song he completed in Venice, finishing another, and composing three more within the year. The cycle that emerged from the poems was later published and dedicated to Winaretta Singer.

At first glance upon the title, one may expect an Italianate style in Fauré’s Mélodies, but in fact “de Venise” only refers to the location in which he began the songs, and through and through they are as French as the texts upon which they draw. Fauré crafted five songs in all from Verlaine’s poesy: “Mandoline,” “En sourdine” (“Muted”), “Green,” “À Clymène” (“To Clymène”), and “C’est extase langoureuse” (“It is the languorous ecstasy”). Besides the general theme of love that weaves it way through these five poems, Fauré further enhanced the idea of a song cycle by recalling elements of the first song throughout the other four, particularly in the final one, and thereby creating a strong thematic unity between them. He later used this same technique again in La bonne chanson, which was likewise based on lyrics by Verlaine. The first song of the cycle received its premiere on the day after Fauré’s return from Italy, June 21, 1891, by Marguerite Baugnies. The complete cycle was premiered on April 2, 1892 at the Société Nationale de Musique.         Joseph DuBose

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Cinq melodies "de Venise" Op. 58 (Paul Verlaine)        Gabriel Fauré            

Gariel Fauré's elegant writing style and impeccable poetic and musical taste proved him to be one of the most graceful, cultivated composers of the late 19^th century.  His remarkable attention to text painting, masterful melodies, and individualistic harmonic construction all define his compositional style.

Fauré's career is said to be marked by a strong rivalry with Claude Debussy.  The parallel nature of their lives -  leads us to an understanding of how both gentlemen came to much of the same poetry, including the exquisite poems of Paul Verlaine on this program.

Cinq melodies "de Venise", Opus 58, were written by Fauré in Venice and Paris in the summer of 1891.  This set of songs is considered a true cycle, including recurring motives and designed in the style of a suite.   Tamara Matthews

Cinq melodies "de Venise                                                    

Mandoline (Mandolin)

The givers of serenades

And the lovely women who listen

Exchange insipid words

Under the singing branches.

There is Thyrsis and Amyntas

And there's the eternal Clytander,

And there's Damis who, for many a

Heartless woman, wrote many a tender verse.

Their short silk coats,

Their long dresses with trains,

Their elegance, their joy

And their soft blue shadows,

Whirl around in the ecstasy

Of a pink and grey moon,

And the mandolin prattles

Among the shivers from the breeze.

En Sourdine (Muted)

Calm in the half-day

That the high branches make,

Let us soak well our love

In this profound silence.

Let us mingle our souls, our hearts

And our ecstatic senses

Among the vague langours

Of the pines and the bushes.

Close your eyes halfway,

Cross your arms on your breast,

And from your sleeping heart

Chase away forever all plans.

Let us abandon ourselves

To the breeze, rocking and soft,

Which comes to your feet to wrinkle

The waves of auburn lawns.

And when, solemnly, the evening

From the black oaks falls,

The voice of our despair,

The nightingale, will sing.

C'est l'extaselangoureuse

It is languorous ecstasy,

It is the fatigue after love,

It is all the rustling of the wood,

In the embrace of breezes;

It is near the gray branches:

A chorus of tiny voices.

Oh, what a frail and fresh murmur!

It babbles and whispers,

It resembles the soft noise

That waving grass exhales.

You might say it were, under the bending stream,

The muffled sound of rolling pebbles.

This soul, which laments

And this dormant moan,

It is ours, is it not?

It is not mine and yours,

Whose humble anthem we breathe

On this mild evening, so very quietly?

Green

Here are some fruit, some flowers, some leaves and some branches,

And then here is my heart, which beats only for you.

Do not rip it up with your two white hands,

And may the humble present be sweet in your beautiful eyes!

I arrive all covered in dew,

Which the wind of morning comes to freeze on my forehead.

Suffer my fatigue as I repose at your feet,

Dreaming of dear instants that will refresh me.

On your young breast allow my head to rest,

Still ringing with your last kisses;

Let it calm itself after the pleasant tempest,

And let me sleep a little, since you are resting.

A Clymene (To Clymene)

Mystic barcarolles,

Songs without words,

My darling, because your eyes,

The color of the heavens,

Because your voice, strange

Vision that upsets

And troubles the horizon

Of my reason.

Because the wonderful aroma

Of your cygnet-like pallor.

And because the distinctness

Of your fragrance.    

Ah! Because your entire existence,

Like music that pervades all,

Nimbuses of former angels,

Tones and perfumes.

Has, in wondrous cadences,

Attracted into a connection

My subtle heart:

Let it be praised! Amen.

Courtesy of International Music Foundation.