Madeleine de Valmaléte & Monique Haas (piano)
The Swiss Piano Recitals
rec. 1957-74
Legendary French Pianists Vol. 2
Meloclassic MC1079 [2 CDs: 158]
Monique Haas is the more familiar name of the two pianists presented on this double CD but there is no real reason that that should be the case; in his notes to an Arbiter disc devoted to Madeleine de Valmalète (Arbiter 144 review ~ review) her pupil Eric Ferrand-N’Kaoua suggests that this is because she never toured America, cared little for personal renown and made few recordings all of which may be true but the caprices of fate have also played their part. Her Chopin Ballades recorded in 1975 by EMI France were unissued and her other studio recordings are quite obscure. We have Arbiter to thanks for releasing her 1928 Polydor discs as well as some Mozart recorded when she was 93. I won’t repeat the biographical information included in those reviews other than to say that Valmalète, for all her name is known only to pianophiles, appeared to impress all that were acquainted with her, Camille Saint-Saëns, Maurice Ravel, Alfred Cortot amongst them. She passed away in 1999, five days after her 100th birthday.
We now have Meloclassic to thank for a studio recital from 1957 featuring composers from her core repertoire; Fauré, a composer she had played alongside Jacques Thibaud, Scarlatti, Liszt, who featured in her several recordings, and Schumann. She plays the two impromptus with an easy and supple virtuosity, a legacy of her studies with Isidor Philipp who emphasised the development of a rounded finger technique. The D flat nocturne has a glorious sense of line and a passion toward the end that just begins to show the limitations of the studio piano she is given. Her fingerwork comes to the fore in two Scarlatti sonatas though this is not empty show; the first, Kirkpatrick 24 not the rather similar K.39 that is listed, has a halting little snap to its rhythms and in a rather old and free style of performance she adds octaves and doubled bass notes to the flourishes in the final bars. K.380 is brisk but admirably dance like. Her Liszt is spectacular with cadenzas that are as delicate as can be and shimmering in the quasi zimbalo sections. She closes with Schumann’s Carneval in a performance that demonstrates the accuracy of Saint-Saëns’ words after a 1917 recital; she understands and makes people understand; the virtuosity completely disappears and there remains only the music. I have heard several very good recordings recently and have reviewed three over the last couple of years. De Valmalète suffers nothing in comparison with those and brings a personal touch to the pieces; the contrasts in Pierrot make for a fine comical figure and there is delicacy and real tenderness in Arlequin, Eusebius and the central sections of the Valse noble and indeed in many places throughout. Coquette is more light-hearted than usual, seasoned flirtation rather than shy come hither and she is followed by a featherlight and fleet papillons. Reconnasissance is similarly impressive, buoyant and engaging, her voicing in Chopin and Estrella is superb and the almost conversational end of Aveu is delicious. A fine carneval through and through.
The rest of CD1 and CD2 is given over to Radio Bern recitals given by Monique Haas. Haas is a somewhat more familiar name than Valmalète but it is still good to have more of her artistry available. She was born a decade after Valmalète in October 1909 and studied at the Paris Conservatoire under Joseph Morpain who was also Clara Haskil’s teacher. She then went on to Lazare-Lévy’s advanced class, a pedagogue who gave more weight to interpretation and freedom of expression than Isidor Philipp was wont to do. While touring extensively she studied privately with Robert Casadesus and later Rudolf Serkin. She became known as a player of contemporary music and quite apart from her marriages to composers Edward Stämpfli and Marcel Mihalovici she made the acquaintance of, and performed music by Francis Poulenc, Bohuslav Martinů, Tibor Harsanyi, Paul Hindemith and André Jolivet amongst many others. In contrast to de Valmatète she toured in America and the list of orchestras and conductors she worked with is seemingly as long as the number of modern composers she championed. She died in 1987, just three years after she sustained severe burns in a fire in the apartment she shared with her second husband Mihalovici.
Her 1974 recital contains two works by Joseph Haydn, his F major sonata and the sparkling Fantasia in C. Both are characterised by superbly supple, clean lines while the sonata’s rather beautiful adagio is given an unsentimental but poised reading. The programme for her October 1960 recital was more varied and included composers that she championed such as Darius Milhaud whose two piano concerto she played in the 1950s. She was also known as an exponent of French music and she opens with a glorious warm-hearted performance of the first book of Images that has some fabulous pedalling at the opening of reflets dans l’eau and just the right clarity of fingerwork in mouvement. Very little is heard of Milhaud’s piano music so it is nice to have his short suite l’Automne; its three movements are Septembre with its pastorale mood, the virtuosic Alfama, vibrant and bustling and entirely suitable if, as the name suggests, it depicts the old city in Lisbon and the tender adieu. In more austere mood she finishes with two of Messian’s Vingt Regards sur l’enfant-Jésus, the hypnotic regard du père and the joyous Noël. This is relatively early to be programming this work, Yvonne Loriod until then perhaps its sole performer – was it being played by anyone else at this time? Haas’ regard du père is quite fast, even faster than Loriod’s – John Ogden, Steven Osborne and Peter Serkin all top 8 minutes – and it’s a little meatier than some but it is admirably phrased and she is spirited in Noël, ebullient but less raucous than some more modern performances.
The centrepiece of her December 1970 recital was Kreisleriana by Schumann, apparently one of the few romantic composers she programmed. I find it accomplished without being strikingly individual and while she still has the technique for the urgent numbers it is in the lyrical passages that she shines, especially the recitative like fourth. I was a little disappointed with the final Schnell und spieland where she doesn’t always balance the nobility and verve that she brings to the middle sections with the hushed, almost fantastical magic that the opening theme and its repeats, displaced left hand octaves and all can have. Meloclassic have released a recording of her playing the work in 1948 (Meloclassic MC1024) which I haven’t heard and it would be interesting to see what she made of it over two decades earlier. Her Rameau and Debussy are finely crafted and I have to say she probably leaves the best till last; Bartók’s six dances in Bulgarian rhythm sound like they were written for her and are played as if she were born with these rhythms in her bones. The applause is generous and well deserved.
Meloclassic have done it again, lifting the veils that have shaded our view of these two fine pianists; if I say that I have a special admiration and affection for the playing of Madeleine de Valmalète that is not to diminish my appreciation of the exuberant and elegant playing of Monique Haas. There is so much here that neither pianist recorded commercially, even more reason to seek out this set. As always biographical information is fulsome and the audio restoration of these old studio recordings is excellent.
Rob Challinor
Availability: Meloclassic
Contents
CD1
Gabriel Fauré (1845-1924)
Impromptu No.2 in F minor Op.31
Impromptu No.5 in F sharp minor Op.102
Nocturne No.6 in D flat major Op.63
Domenico Scarlatti (1685-1757)
Sonata in A major K.24
Sonata in E major K.380
Franz Liszt (1811-1886)
Hungarian Rhapsodie No.10 in E major S.244 No.10
Robert Schumann (1810-1856)
Carneval Op.9
Madeleine de Valmaléte (piano)
rec. 11th Jan, 1957 Radio Genève, Studio 2, Geneva (radio studio recording)
Joseph Haydn (1732-1809)
Sonata in F major Hob.XVI:23
Fantasia in C major Capriccio Hob.XVII:4
Monique Haas (piano)
rec. 25th March, 1974 Radio Bern (radio studio recording)
CD2
Claude Debussy (1862-1918)
Images Book.1 L.110
Darius Milhaud (1892-1974)
L’Automne three pieces for piano Op.115
Olivier Messiaen (1908-1992)
Vingt Regards sur l’enfant-Jésus
No.1 regard du père
No.13 Noël
Monique Haas
rec. 14th Oct, 1960 Radio Basel, studio M3, Basel (radio studio recording)
Robert Schumann
Kreisleriana Op.16
Jean Philippe Rameau (1683-1764)
Le Rappel des Oiseaux
Claude Debussy
Étude No.7 pour les degrés chromatiques L.136
Bela Bartók
Six Dances in Bulgarian Rhythm from Mikrokosmos
Monique Haas
rec. 2nd Dec, 1970 Radio Bern (live recording)
