11.7.2011 - Saint Saëns [REPEAT]

[Roslynmuse]

I was thinking in particular of the excruciatingly sentimental slow movement and the unbalanced finale of the Organ symphony, where overenthusiasm got the better of good ideas and the composer's hand was prematurely overplayed, Roslynmuse. S-A

I was forgetting that piece! I can take the slow movement, viscous as it is, but once we hit The Chord at the start of the finale we are on compositional auto-pilot.

I suspect S-S's antipathy to Debussy had more to do with structure than harmony per se, although I suppose both could be seen as a manifestation of a deeply ingrained distrust of the unresolved. Do we have anything on record re his thoughts about Ravel? More congenial to him perhaps?

[ardcarp]

the unbalanced finale of the Organ symphony, where overenthusiasm got the better of good ideas and the composer's hand was prematurely overplayed

............but the Organ Symphony and Le Carnaval des Animaux are SS's most popular works, so maybe he was a 'better' and more original composer when he wasn't in a wholly serious mood.

[Serial_Apologist]

And of course one shouldn't forget that first ever orchestral use of the xylophone was in Danse Macabre (1875) - or so I read once.

[Op. XXXIX]

I was forgetting that piece! I can take the slow movement, viscous as it is, but once we hit The Chord at the start of the finale we are on compositional auto-pilot.

Did you mean vacuous for viscous? As for The Chord at the start of the finale, I well remember how it thrilled me as a teen, particularly the old BSO recording with Munch.

[rauschwerk]

I was thinking in particular of the excruciatingly sentimental slow movement and the unbalanced finale of the Organ symphony, where overenthusiasm got the better of good ideas and the composer's hand was prematurely overplayed...

Much I used to enjoy the Organ Symphony, I agree and think Martin Cooper had it about right in 1952: "The third symphony ... seems now to show a perceptible falling-off in the quality of the material and even in the aptness of its handling." He suggests that much of the composer's best work appeared in the 1870s and includes most of the symphonic poems, Samson and Delilah (how many people know this opera in its entirety?), the first cello concerto, the fourth piano concerto and the Beethoven variations for two pianos. To this I would add Carnival and the third violin concerto.

[3rd Viennese School]

mvt 2 of symphony no.3 is good! So good it was on the testcard.
(Channnel 4)

3VS

[ardcarp]

Just a few ramblings about S-S.


1. Samson as pronounced in French sounds almost the same as Saint-Saens!

I remember being profoundly disappointed by Samson et Dalila.

2. I was quite charmed by the short extract from Samson and Delila today; beautifully written, though wholly in the 'Germanic' tradition.

As for The Chord at the start of the finale, I well remember how it thrilled me as a teen

3. Dame Gillian Weir was on Woman's Hour the other day, and was rightly announced as one of the most famous organists in the world. They played a very short extract from The Organ Symphony...the start of the finale with 'The Chords'. Not sure they really showed off her world-class status! Mrs Ardcarp said, "I could do that...."

[Op. XXXIX]

[Cooper] suggests that much of the composer's best work appeared in the 1870s and includes most of the symphonic poems, Samson and Delilah (how many people know this opera in its entirety?)...

I've never seen it (a real slap-up production ought to be a great show), but I have worked my way through the Vickers recording. Some very fine music, indeed.

Wiki lists 12 other operas. One occasionally encounters a reference to Henry VIII, but never any of the others. Why are they so neglected? Is the music impossibly dated, are they -like Meyerbeer's- expensive to mount, are the libretti beyond salvage? Any ideas? I've never heard a note of these operas.

[Roslynmuse]

@ Op XXXIX - no, I meant viscous as in syrupy. The Munch recording was the one I got to know it from too. Re Samson et Dalila - the Vickers recording is the one I know too. I'm afraid it it did nothing for me - although I used to listen to the Bacchanale over and over as a young teen and I still enjoy the memory of liking that extract!

The Urbs Roma Symphony extract yesterday seemed to me to anticpate some of the British Light Music we had such a lot of the other week - a sort of Franco-Prussian Vivian Ellis (catchy tune over chromatic Wagner dotted rhythm bass line). The Requiem extract today looked back to the Requiem of Cherubini, I thought.

Dodgy librettos shouldn't prevent an opera production if an opera's music is worth salvaging. Chabrier's Le roi malgre lui is an oft-quoted case in point. The only other S-S opera apart from S & D and Henri VIII to have been recorded in one called Helene - don't know that either. I have an ancient vocal score of one called L'Ancêtre. It looks very dull - but who knows, in the right hands...

[ardcarp]

There were some lovely examples of S-S in exotic (oriental and Spamish) mode today. It was even hinted (though I don't know on what grounds) that he might have tried some 'substances' whilst in Algeria. One is left wishing he had been able to throw off at least some of the shackles of Austro-Germanic musical language and maybe to have beaten Debussy to a new sound-world.