Montage # 102 - C’est poétique

As of May 24, 2013, this montage will no longer be available on Pod-O-Matic. It can be heard or downloaded from the Internet Archive at the following address / A compter du 24 mai 2013, ce montage ne sera plus disponible en baladodiffusion Pod-O-Matic. Il peut être téléchargé ou entendu au site Internet Archive à l'adresse suivante:

 https://archive.org/details/Pcast102


pcast102- Playlist

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I don’t think I have done something like this before – revisiting a Tuesday Blog for a Friday podcast.

The Tuesday blog in question is one of my first in the series on TalkClassical (http://www.talkclassical.com/blogs/itywltmt/237-poems-music.html), and it discussed “poetry and music”. As part of the musical illustrations I used, there were a number of “musical poems”, two of which are predominantly featured in today’s podcast.

In fact, all the works programmed today have “poem” in their title.

In the case of at least three of them, we have a soloist and orchestra setting. One could suggest that the “solo instrument” is the poet, and that he is accompanied by the orchestra. This is precisely the programmatic formula of Griffes's Poem for Flute and Orchestra.

Although not a household name, Charles Tomlinson Griffes played an important role in the development of the American art song. Griffes possessed one of the most distinctive voices in American music. It is regrettable that he suffered an untimely death, at the age of thirty-five, just as he reached the pinnacle of his career. Off the same album of Canadian and American orchestral pieces by the CBC Vancouver Orchestra, I selected  Healey Willan’s Poem for Strings.

Two other works that feature soloist and orchestra stanbd out in this list: the quite elaborate Poem of Fire by Scriabin is one of the Russian’s many “poems” – the Poem of Ecstasy is the other major Scriabin poem that comes to mind. The other, the simple poème by Ernest Chausson has long-been a violin and orchestra standard., Interestingly, the work’s original title (and inspiration) was to be The Song of Love Triumphant (Le Chant de l'amour triomphant) after the work of an acquaintance, the Russian writer Ivan Turgenev.

Another work for solo instrument and orchestra is the lyrical poème eligiaque by the French-Canadian born, later naturalized American composer and conductor Rosario Bourdon. Bourdon is associated not only with the early days of what would become the Montreal Symphony, but also a staff conductor for the Victor Talking Machine Company.: 

The final selection is by Glazunov; one of his two poems for orchestra: the Poème Epique.

I think you will love this music too.

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Commentaire français

Je crois qu'il s'agît ici d'une première: l'usage d'un sujet exploré lors d'un billetr du mardi pour un montage du vendredi. Le montage en question est "Poésie et musique", un billet de faveur de juillet 2011 (http://itywltmt.blogspot.ca/2011/07/poesie-et-musique.html).

Le sujet de ce billet considérait la poésie au sens lagre. Le montage d'aujourd'hui reprend une paire de sélections du billet d'alors, mais dans une thématique qui se limite à des "poèmes en musique" p toutes les oeuvres retenues ont le titre commun de poème.

Les deux sélections en question sont du compositeur Américain Charles Griffes (son Poem piur flûte et orchestre) et le célébrissime Poème pour volon et orchestre d'Ernest Chausson. L'usage de la formule soliste et orchestre n'est poa unique à ces deux oeuvres, comme l'illustrent la paire de pièces pour soliste et orchestre que j'ai ajouté. Le premier est l'oeuvre d'un musicien Canadien qui a rou;lé sa bosse en Amé.rique, Rosario Bourdon.

L'autre est un des nombreux poèmes de Scriabine. Chez Scriabin, on a l’embarras du choix: poèmes pour piano seul (op. 32, op. 41, op. 44, op. 69), Poeme Tragique, op. 34, Poeme Satanique, op. 36, Poème fantastique, op. 45 no. 2, et ma sélection Prométhée, le poème du feu, op. 60.

Pour compléter le tout, Poem for Strings d'Healey WIllan (provenant du même album que le Griffes) et le 

Poème Epique de Glazounov.

Bonne écoute!