French School Pianists play French concertos
rec. 1930-1949
APR 7319 [3 CDs: 223]

This may be the most interesting release yet in APR’s brilliant French Piano School series. We have three CDs filled with French concertos and concertante works in rare recordings with twelve different pianists of the grand tradition. All the records are from the 78rpm era, and they are all electrical recordings. The repertory is varied but the quality of performance is consistently high. Transfers of the records has been handled by the hugely experienced audio engineer Mark Obert-Thorn.

The French tradition of piano playing fostered at the Paris Conservatoire and handed down over generations is a complicated tale with many strands. It goes together I think with the establishment of a couple of piano firms, Érard and Pleyel, in Paris and the music being written and performed in France and indeed Western Europe during the Nineteenth Century. Professors at the Conservatoire like Louis Diémer, Antonin Marmontel (son of Antoine-François) and Georges Mathias (taught by both Kalkbrenner and Chopin) passed their techniques down to the likes of Isidor Philipp, Marguerite Long, Alfred Cortot and Lazare-Lévy whose many students exemplify the riches of le jeu perlé. All the pianists in this set have lineage back to these teachers and their methods.

The students would learn music theory (solfège), piano and often composition. They would often arrive very young and go through preliminary stages. The coveted Premier Prix they would strive for at the end of their studies marked a passing-out and the start of their career. Marguerite Long, who has already featured on two releases in the series once described French music as basically “lucid, precise and slender” and “concentrating above all on grace, rather than force”. This could equally well be applied to the style of playing the French school is associated with.

The first concerto on the disc is Saint-Saëns’ Piano Concerto No. 2 in G minor played by Jeanne-Marie Darré. She was a student of Isidor Philipp, and like him a huge advocate of Saint-Saëns. She performed all his concerti in a single concert in 1926, still not yet twenty-one years of age. This legendary undertaking was repeated at other points in her career too, and she recorded the works memorably for Pathé/HMV in the mid-1950s (monaural recordings). This version of No. 2 is an earlier 78 set also made for Pathé in 1948. It was available in British catalogues but was in competition with other three-record sets by Moura Lympany and Benno Moiseiwitsch. I am not sure how well it sold on these shores. There is much to admire in Darré’s pianism. Her clean and elegant passage work is the main feature you will notice. There is absolutely no forcing and the lightest touch. The recording rather emphasises this, being light in the bass. Paul Paray conducts, as he did for that monumental night in Paris in the Summer of 1926.

Next on the first CD is the Piano Concerto No. 4, also by Saint-Saëns in the famous HMV set made by Alfred Cortot. Cortot was taught by Chopin pupil Émile Decombes and the great Louis Diémer. He was a superb all-round musician, not just a pianist but a wonderful conductor too, who honed this attribute of his artistry at Bayreuth. He was a huge advocate for Wagner in France. Cortot is not perhaps the ideal exponent of the French piano school. He used the pedal a good deal and was a poet of the keyboard unafraid to wear his heart on his sleeve. His version of Saint-Saëns 4 is probably the finest ever made and mandatory listening. In these old grooves can be the heard Cortot at his finest. I have always adored the records. The six sides of shellac dating from 1935 are transferred superbly here.

The final work on CD1 is Saint-Saëns’ Piano Concerto No. 5 “Egyptian”. APR give us the first recording of the work, made amazingly in wartime Tokyo and issued on four Japanese Victor records. The soloist Kazuko Kusama was the daughter of a diplomat based in Paris. She studied at the Conservatoire with Lazare-Lévy, winning her Premier Prix in 1937. On the outbreak of war in Europe, Kusama returned to Japan where she had a good career. Saint-Saëns 5 is a lovely, enticing and richly themed work which I enjoy hearing. These records must be quite rare. The set sourced for this transfer was found in Japan and sent to Obert-Thorn in the US. I am sorry to report, despite Mark’s undoubtedly heroic efforts it is a disappointing sonic experience. The recording is very recessed, and the surfaces are quite noisy too. Mercifully the restoration is honest; there is minimal interference and filtering, but it leaves much to be desired. If we consider the marvellous andante movement, here Saint-Saëns takes us on a world tour thematically, but we hear little of the effects. The opening string chords are almost inaudible, and the piano tone is obscured heavily, we strain to hear Saint-Saëns’s lovely arpeggios. The Nubian love song at 3:07, from which the concerto gets its nickname and the Javanese (I think) melody at 5:30 need more vivid sound than we have here. Saint-Saëns portrays all manner of creatures in his tonal picture and goes on to treat us to a Middle Eastern portrait too. What a shame, as it is evident from what we can hear, Kusama is a refined artist.

From the youngest pianist on the record, we next move back a generation. Marcelle Herrenschmidt, another pupil of Philipp is heard in Widor’s Fantaisie. The short concertante style genre, named Fantaisie, was to become quite popular in France. Debussy wrote one soon after Widor’s and later in this disc we will hear a couple more. The romantic idiom is well caught and Herrenschmidt gives a winning performance. She shows considerable dexterity and finesse throughout. The French Polydors have come out reasonably well. They must be very rare. Périlhou’s Fantaisie dates from the early 1890s, a few years after Widor’s. In it we hear Lucien Wurmser who studied under Charles-Wilfrid de Bériot. Wurmser has already featured in this series with some of his acoustic records. He can be heard in chamber music sets of Beethoven and Schumann amongst other things, but APR have chosen to showcase his art with these rare three sides he made for Boîte à Musique in 1939. De Bériot taught Ricardo Viñes, Ravel and Granados. He was the son of violinist Charles Auguste de Bériot and the magnificent soprano Maria Malibran. He cannot have remembered his legendary mother who died (in Manchester) when he was only three years old, but he was raised by another fabled singer, Pauline Viardot. I mention these genealogical links as the French piano tradition and the bel canto singing method are linked and in the de Bériot school we can see and hear it most obviously. Wurmser is mercurial in the wonderful central section of the Fantaisie. His tone is almost transparent, and the articulation is supreme. I hugely enjoyed hearing this splendid work in this magical performance. Why not drop in at 5:34 for a minute or so and you will know exactly what I mean.

Fauré’s Fantaisie is a late work dating from 1918. It is played by Jean Doyen, a disciple of Marguerite Long who was a prolific recorder. We have his complete Fauré on record from the LP era and APR have already furnished us with his pre-war Ultraphones, HMVs and the Chopin and Liszt he recorded in the early 1940s too. Doyen is an elegant pianist with a polished style. These two 78s from French HMV date from late 1949 and the sound is very fine. I would urge you in addition to try and hear his Gaspard de la nuit if you can. This Fauré piece is harder to love than his much earlier Ballade, but it is worth persevering with. I cannot imagine a better performance than it receives here.

Poulenc is perhaps the odd one out of the twelve pianists in this collection. Although he studied under Ricardo Viñes who became a spiritual mentor to him, Poulenc never enrolled at the Conservatoire de Paris. His Aubade of 1929 is a ballet, very much in the style of neo-classical Stravinsky for piano and small orchestra. It makes a change in style in the programme, and I approve heartily of its inclusion in the running order. The records were three blue label French Columbia ten-inch discs from 1930, so quite early electrics really. The sound is terrific in these new remasterings. Poulenc is a good advocate of the work, and his meticulous rapid runs are I suppose in the tradition of the school he was forbidden from entering as a boy. It is a surprisingly decently played account of the work. I don’t mean that disrespectfully, just that the piece was brand new in a modern style and orchestral practices in France at the time were not always tip-top.

Marguerite Roesgen-Champion was also a noted harpsichordist. After the war when Otto Klemperer made some records in Paris with the “Pro Musica Chamber Orchestra” she played on his Bach Brandenburg 5. This was issued over six Polydor sides and later a Vox LP. We hear her in two charming pieces of her own creation called Idylle and Passepied,recorded for HMV in 1941. Light music at its very best.

The composer Jean Françaix was also a great pianist who gained his Premier Prix at the age of eighteen from Isidore Philipp’s class no less. APR give us two of his recordings made only a couple of weeks apart but in different locales and on different labels. The wonderful early perky Concertino of 1932 comes in a slightly muddy recording on Telefunken made with the Berlin Philharmonic Orchestra. What a great little work this is, perhaps my favourite of this composer. Philipp’s training is exemplified by Françaix’s dashing yet elegant fingerwork. The Piano Concerto of 1936, at twice the length of the earlier work, is still only sixteen minutes long. In this record Nadia Boulanger (Jean’s beloved teacher of composition) conducts him and a French orchestra for HMV. This really is a first-rate work which I would urge you to hear regardless of your interest in this disc. Françaix scores a large band, but he uses his resources with such economy and delicacy. The music is quintessentially French in the way I quoted Mme Long earlier. As in the Concertino, Françaix’s playing is charming and gracious. Boulanger conducts so sensitively. One of my favourite experiences on the record, I think. Incidentally much later in the 1970s Françaix’s daughter recorded the work for Vox. On that disc her father conducts.

Blue-blooded Arnaud de Gontaut-Biron, Marquis of Saint-Blancard, studied under Louis Diémer at the Conservatory. His career was not a huge one, yet he plays the Sauguet Concerto in a fresh, precise style. The work is along with his ballet score Les forains, the best way to get to know this composer. Sauguet also wrote a cello concerto for Rostropovich much later. He was influenced by his teacher Koechlin and by Satie, I think. Ballets were his thing and there are many that still await a recording. The notes tell us the original pair of records that were used in this transfer are from Gontaut-Biron’s own collection. The booklet tells us these shellacs are incredibly rare, made under the regime of Vichy France and were not for general sale. I note however that the records are listed in the early 1950s edition of WERM (World Encyclopaedia of Recorded Music) and I have seen other issues including a 7-inch EP that French Columbia put out in the 1950s. I am glad APR included this disc in their survey as we ought to hear more of this composer’s output.

Ravel’s two concerti round off the survey of French pianists in French concertos. We hear a couple of rarities. In the Left Hand we are treated to a transfer of the five sides made by French Columbia in 1942 featuring Jacques Février and the Paris Conservatoire under Charles Munch. Those original records did have Münch printed with umlauts and APR’s documentation is correct here. Février was a pupil of both Édouard Risler and Marguerite Long and a close friend of Poulenc. One of the quirks of the discography of this concerto is that its first three recordings were all conducted by Charles Munch. The work was first recorded by Jacqueline Blancard in 1938 in Paris. Blancard has not yet appeared on this APR series although she did study at the Conservatory with Philipp. The Polydor sides were issued after the war on Decca X204/5. The following year, Alfred Cortot took the Left Hand into the Paris studios and this time it was an HMV job (not amongst Cortot’s finest records for me). As interesting as these earlier accounts are, you need to hear this version by Jacques Février. I believe Février was coached in the work by Ravel himself and it is a stunning traversal of the great D minor piece. The reading is dark and profound in the right places yet also sparkles and glistens at the next turn. Columbia’s sanctioning of splitting it over five sides allows Février to be that touch more expansive than his earlier competitors on record. The sound Obert-Thorn extracts from these old grooves is fantastic and the transfer is a winner. On the original 78s the fill up was Noctuelles from Miroirs but we don’t hear that I’m afraid.

Finally, Ravel’s Concerto in G is heard in the performance by Émile Passani. This artist studied with Philipp and went on to have a good career not just on the piano but as a choral trainer too. His 1947 of the Ravel Concerto was made for Pathé. I had never heard it prior to reviewing this set. After Long premiered the work under Ravel’s direction in January 1932, they took it around Europe together. The records Mme Long made for Columbia in April though were not conducted by Ravel, despite saying so on the labels. Notwithstanding Marguerite Long’s advocacy, her style, the weeks of experience she had playing it in all the great capitals of Europe, with Ravel himself on the podium, I find these premier records made by the great artist not fully satisfying. Her later version made in 1952 is even worse. Prior to stereo sound and Michelangeli I would until now have struggled to name a great account of the work on 78s or monaural LP. How nice to finish the CD with such a great performance. Émile Passani, may indeed have left the Conservatory without a Premier Prix but I award him one now for his superb account of this amazing concerto. All the key attributes of the celebrated French tradition are here. The airy, graceful, gentle, whisper-soft tone he has. Helped by a really nice recording and some characteristic playing from the Concerts Colonne, conducted by Jean Fournet. Passani’s slow movement will hypnotise you with its flowing beauty; such elegance and another example if one were need by now of le jeu perlé. The final side containing the jazzy presto is just perfect. What a finish!

This is APRs finest showing yet in their series “The French Piano School”. I do hope you get chance to hear it. Performances like these, and the efforts labels like APR make to put them on the market really need to be shared widely.

Philip Harrison

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Contents
Saint-Saëns: Piano Concerto No. 2 in G minor, Op. 22
Jeanne-Marie Darré
Orchestre des Concerts Colonne/Paul Paray
rec. 24 February 1948, Théâtre des Champs-Élysées, Paris

Saint-Saëns: Piano Concerto No. 4 in C minor, Op. 44
Alfred Cortot
Unnamed Orchestra/Charles Munch
rec. 9 July 1935, Abbey Road Studio No 1, London

Saint-Saëns: Piano Concerto No. 5 in F major, Op. 103 ‘Egyptian‘
Kazuko Kusama
Tokyo Symphony Orchestra/Hisatada Otaka
rec. 1943, Tokyo

Widor: Fantaisie in A flat major, Op. 62
Marcelle Herrenschmidt
Orchestre Philharmonique de Paris/Charles Munch
rec. October 1938, Paris

Périlhou: Fantaisie Pour Piano et Orchestre
Lucien Wurmser, 
Orchestre des Concerts Colonne/Victor Gallois
rec. 1939, Paris

Fauré: Fantaisie in G Major, Op. 111
Jean Doyen
Orchestre Lamoureux/Jean Fournet
rec. on 12 December 1949, Théâtre des Champs-Élysées, Paris

Poulenc: Aubade, FP 51
Francis Poulenc
Orchestre des Concerts Straram/Walther Straram
rec. 20 and 22 January 1930, Théâtre des Champs-Élysées, Paris 

Roesgen-Champion: Trois pièces pour piano et orchestre à cordes – Idylle and Passepied
Marguerite Roesgen-Champion
Orchestre des Concerts Marius-François Gaillard/Marius-François Gaillard
rec. 30 May 1941, Studio Albert, Paris

Françaix: Concertino pour piano et orchestre
Jean Françaix 
Berliner Philharmoniker/Leo Borchard
rec. 26 February 1937, Beethovensaal, Berlin

Françaix: Concerto pour piano et orchestre
Jean Françaix 
Orchestre Philharmonique de Paris/Nadia Boulanger
rec. 9 February 1937, Studio Albert, Paris

Sauguet: Piano Concerto No. 1 in A Minor
Arnaud de Gontaut-Biron
Paris Conservatoire Orchestra/Roger Desormiere
rec. 29 June 1943, Studio Albert, Paris

Ravel: Piano Concerto for the left hand in D minor
Jacques Février
Paris Conservatoire Orchestra/Charles Munch
rec. 8 October 1942, Studio Albert, Paris

Ravel: Piano Concerto in G major
Émile Passani
Orchestre des Concerts Colonne/Jean Fournet
rec. 28 October 1947, Théâtre des Champs-Élysées, Paris