France - A Musical Journey: Cathedrals and Megaliths, Calvaries
and Tapestries from Brittany to the Loire
With music by Gabriel FAURÉ (1845-1924)
Requiem. (Chs 1-7). Lisa Beckley, (soprano); Nicholas Gedge,
(bass-baritone); with Colm Carey (organ). Schola Cantorum of Oxford and Oxford
Camerata/Jeremy Summerly fom Naxos 8.550765
Pavane, Op. 50 (Ch. 8); Sicilienne, Op. 78 (Ch.
9); Berceuse, Op. 16 (Ch. 10) Slovak Radio Symphony Orchestra/Keith
Clark, from Naxos 8.550088
No recording dates or venues, given
Dts Digital Surround Sound. Dolby Digital. Aspect ratio 4:3
NAXOS DVD 2.110249 [77.56]
In my review of
what I might now call part one of this journey, the music of Chopin, born in
1810, was chosen as an appropriate background to the wonderful pictures. Although
Chopin was the son of a French father and a Polish mother he spent his early
life in Poland before leaving in 1830 and setting up home in Paris where he
died in 1849. I found the choice of his second piano concerto somewhat strange
and not particularly appropriate for the pictures. Strangely, there was no
coverage at all of the Limousin area, and particularly the scenic village of Gargilesse-Dampiere
where the composer conducted his affair with the novelist Georges Sands and
which also drew many painters including Claude Monet and Théodore Rousseau.
The music really seemed purely background and bore little thematic or emotional
relationship with what was being shown. In this second volume the music of
the very French composer Gabriel Fauré is chosen and a definite effort
seems to have been made to match the music to the visual locations.
Fauré was a pupil of Saint-Saens at the Ecole Niedermeyer in Paris before
becoming assistant organist at St Sulpice, later moving to the Madeleine. The
latter is a dark forbidding building on the route from the Seine past the magnificent
façade of the Palais Garnier to the Boulevard Haussemann in that district
renovated with so much wonderful architecture under the Second Empire. At the
Madeleine Fauré became deputy to Saint-Saëns and subsequently Choirmaster.
There he wrote a large number of songs. In 1892 he became inspector of French
provincial conservatories and four years later principal organist at the Madeleine.
In the same year he at last found employment as a teacher of composition at
the Conservatoire after the death of the old director Ambroise Thomas, who
had found Fauré too much of a modernist.
Fauré became director of the Conservatoire in 1905, a position he held
until 1920. His pupils there included Ravel, Enescu and Nadia Boulanger. His
musical language bridged a gap between the romanticism of the nineteenth century
and the more modern, but tonal music of the twentieth century and is characterised
by his
gift for melody and a particularly personal manner, as the accompanying leaflet
puts it. The initial version of his Requiem was first performed at the
Madeleine in 1888, its five movements later expanded and with a final version
published in 1901.
The sub-title of this photographic collection, Cathedrals and Megaliths,
Calvaries and Tapestries from Brittany to the Loire, is, to say the least,
somewhat understated in respect of the geography and content. In reality its
coverage extends to the Comté in the Jura in the far east of France.
Whilst the content initially focuses on churches and holy places it also takes
in the remoteness of the Grande Briere in the South of Brittany and the rocky
archipelago of the Isles de Chaussey an hour’s sail off the coast of
Normandy. There are pastoral scenes, a yacht journey and lovely evenings and
sunsets as well as a tour of Honfleur in Normandy.
Given the title there are few better places to start than the mighty Cathedral
atop the city of Chartres, sitting on the river Eure. (Chapter 1). The
imposing west front of this thirteenth century church is matched by the awesome
carvings and stained glasswork seen from the inside. In the seventeenth century
a canal some 36 miles long was built from La Grande Briere, that strange marshland
at the south of Brittany so as to link the Loire with the Seine. There are
fine evening views of the 1890 aqueduct constructed to take the canal over
the river. The Introit and Kyrie form an atmospheric accompaniment.
Chapter 2 moves into Brittany proper, a region of many appropriate monuments,
particularly in the west of Finistere. These include the grand church at Pleyben
with its calvaire and the more famous one at Locranon with views of its church
and cemetery. Further south are Les alignements, the megaliths of Carnac,
now a World Heritage Site. These date from the fifth millennium BC and extend
for a distance of six kilometres. Thirty years ago I could wander among then,
nowadays they are fenced off. A lingering panoramic view could have shown their
extent, close-ups do not catch the flavour of the place. One can still wonder
among Les géants at Kerzerho, just north of Carnac where the large upright
stones live up to their name and are a wonder to behold.
In his Requiem Fauré avoids the terrors of the Day of Judgement familiar
from the traditional Dies irae. The general mood is one of tranquillity
and hope. The Offertory, its text slightly adapted, was one of the two movements
added to the original work, which was developed with changed instrumentation
and a baritone soloist. The Offertoire catches the mood here well.
Chapter 3 moves on to Burgundy and some pictures of the mighty Basilica of
Ste-Marie-Madeleine at Vezelay that were included in the previous DVD. Its
hilltop location was once the site of an important Benedictine abbey. The church
was restored in the nineteenth century and remains an example of Romanesque
architecture in what was once an important place of pilgrimage. The Sanctus catches
the mood well, the beauty enhanced by the solo violin against the texture of
lower strings.
Chapter 4 is now in the far east of France to the Franche-Comté in the
Jura. The church of Notre Dame du Haut at Ronchamp was built after the Second
World War, during which the original had been destroyed. Designed by Le Corbusier
it is notable by its distinct break with tradition and its interior lit by
the shafts of light that penetrate through apertures in the concrete walls.
The unfamiliarity of the architecture is contrasted by the Pie Jesu with
its soprano or treble solo being among the most familiar and best loved movements.
Chapter 5 has us back in the Pays de la Loire and the Musée Jean Lurcat
at Angers and where Le Salle des malades of the Hôpital St-Jean, dating
from the twelfth century, now houses the large Aubusson tapestries completed
in 1966. With their vivid colours these are most impressive as are the caves
at Deneze-sous-Doue near Angers which contain a hundred or more carved figures
dating from the sixteenth century.
The setting of the Agnus Dei includes a reference to the opening Requiem
aeternam, and continues the prevailing mood of devotional tranquillity.
Chapter 6 takes the viewer back to the Comté and Les Salines, the historic
salt works at Salins-les-Bains. Regrettably the focus is on the pumping machinery
rather than on any views of the setting of curved architecture. Somewhat strangely
the representation is cut in with glimpses of the remarkable polyptych of The
Last Judgement by Roger van der Weyden, painted for the Hotel-Dieu in Beaune
and depicting the Archangel Michael weighing the souls of the dead and various
religious and contemporary figures. This was included in the previous issue,
which also showed the hospital interior and the patterned roofs of that unique
town. Also included are views of the thirteenth-century church of Notre Dame
in Dijon the West front facade of which is decorated with grotesque animal
and human figures. The music chosen is the Libera me, which includes
the baritone solo who could have been steadier.
Chapter 7 is back in Normandy at the Hambye and Jumieges abbeys. The latter,
now in ruins, was founded in the seventh century. The surviving buildings date
from the eleventh century and owe much to Abbot Robert II, who became Archbishop
of Canterbury in 1051.
The Benedictine abbey of Hambye, near Coutances, was founded in the twelfth
century, and is an early example of Norman Gothic. The flying buttresses and
louring skies also have all too many English connections! The concluding In
paradisum is an appropriate piece in a continuing mood of tranquillity.
Chapter 8 is still focused on Normandy and is accompanied by Fauré’s
elegiac Pavane. It focuses on the quayside of Honfleur at night and
characteristic streets bordered by timbered houses in the day. In my experience,
during the summer, quayside boats are atop with poseur tourists eating their
large plateau de fruits de mer and quaffing Muscadet or Champagne. There
are views of a sunset at Etretat but no views of the rock formations on the
shore. The church of St Catherine, built by shipwrights in the fifteenth century,
is said to resemble an upturned ship.
Chapter 9 plays out to one of Fauré’s less well known pieces, Sicilienne,
Op. 78 that has enjoyed a wide variety of arrangements. Written for cello and
piano it is dedicated to the English cellist W.H. Squire and orchestrated as
incidental music. The camera takes in the richness of the countryside with
its farms, orchards and glimpses of half-timbered thatched houses. The verdant
pasture explains why Normandy is able to sustain cattle and is the home of
cream-based cuisine, its colour and climate reminiscent of England, having
a fair ration of rain. One has to travel south of the Loire to see the grass
somewhat more sparse and less green.
Chapter 10 at first seems a rather strange choice in an issue that stresses
religious connotations. But many of the contents also have a peacefulness of
setting; none more so than this with a yacht visiting Bes de Chausey. The archipelago
of Chausey, with its multitude of rocky islets, is some miles off the Normandy
resort of Granville with an actual voyage taking some fifty minutes, and also
demanding skill in navigation. The sail out there is accompanied by Fauré’s Berceuse,
Op. 16.
The musical performances are more than satisfactory and add an ideal extra
dimension to the images. I imagine there may well be further DVD instalments
in this journey. France has four times the land mass of Britain so there is
plenty of scope. If so, and the music is appropriate an accompaniment as here
then I shall look forward to their issue with eager anticipation.
Robert J Farr