Debussy Orchestrated

 
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CLAUDE DEBUSSY
Debussy Orchestrated
Orchestre National des Pays de la Loire / Pascal Rophé

[ BIS SACD / Hybrid SACD ]

Release Date: Friday 25 February 2022

This item is currently out of stock. It may take 6 or more weeks to obtain from when you place your order as this is a specialist product.

With the present disc, Pascal Rophé and his Orchestre National des Pays de la Loire pay tribute to their great countryman, Claude Debussy - but not with the standard orchestral fare. Debussy Orchestrated paints a portrait of a light-hearted composer, seen through the eyes of two of his collaborators, Henri Büsser and André Caplet, who transferred the works recorded here from the keyboard to the orchestra. In Petite Suite, composed for piano four hands in 1899, Debussy makes allusions to Fêtes galantes by Paul Verlaine, the poet who so often inspired him. Büsser's orchestration of this light and pleasant suite was made in 1907, and obviously pleased Debussy, as he later entrusted him with making an orchestral version of Printemps.

As for Children's Corner and La Boîte à joujoux, it is probably fair to say that the composer's main inspiration was his own daughter, Claude-Emma, born in 1905. Both works are dedicated to her, and it is easy to imagine that some of the characters that appear in Children's Corner had their counterparts among her toys. Letting toys come alive in a ballet was the idea that illustrator André Hellé a few years later presented to Debussy with La Boîte à joujoux. The piano version of the piece was published, with Hellé's illustrations, in time for Christmas in 1913 and Debussy began orchestrating it the following year, but died before he could complete the task. His friend André Caplet - who had already orchestrated Children's Corner - took over and the ballet was finally premièred in December 1919.

"Both La boîte à joujoux and the similarly enchanting Children's Corner are performed with deft panache by this quality orchestra, whose subtly shaded tone and style sound much more like those of earlier French vintages than the globalised full-colour sonority dominating elsewhere today." BBC Music (4/5 stars)

Tracks:

Petite Suite, L. 65, orch. Henri Büsser
La Boîte à joujoux, L. 136, orch. André Caplet
Children's Corner, L. 113, orch. André Caplet