Faure: Requiem, Cantique De Jean Racine, Pavane - Jarvi, Jaroussky, Goerne (2011)

×

Faure: Requiem, Cantique De Jean Racine, Pavane - Jarvi, Jaroussky, Goerne (2011)

Close

The second Virgin Classics CD from the Orchestre de Paris under its new Music Director, Paavo Järvi, is entirely devoted to Fauré, with his Requiem as the centrepiece. The soloists are baritone Matthias Goerne and, singing the Pie Jesu usually assigned to a soprano, countertenor Philippe Jaroussky.

Paavo Järvi assumed his role as Music Director of the Orchestre de Paris at the beginning of the 2010-11 season and this, his second Virgin Classics recording with the orchestra, is based on concerts that took place in Paris in early 2011. Like its predecessor, a programme of Bizet released in Autumn 2010 (admired by the UK’s Observer for the “perfect athleticism and agility … provided in abundance by the Orchestre de Paris under its new conductor, Paavo Järvi), it is entirely devoted to music by one French composer – here Gabriel Fauré. His serene, consoling Requiem is the main work on the CD, which also includes three other much-loved pieces and one little-known item.

“For a conductor from outside France, working on French repertoire with a French orchestra is an exciting prospect, and l’Orchestre de Paris is consummate in this music,” comments Järvi. “I discovered French composers pretty early on, as I was getting to know the Romantic repertoire, with Fauré, Bizet and Dukas. Debussy and Ravel came later. They were a revelation for me.” (Ravel, of course, was a pupil of Fauré at Paris Conservatoire, where the older composer taught for many years.)

The Requiem features two vocal soloists, usually a soprano and a baritone. Here, however, a countertenor – exclusive Virgin Classics artist Philippe Jaroussky – brings his ethereal timbre and sensitive phrasing to the poised Pie Jesu. His baritone colleague is the warm-toned German Matthias Goerne, acknowledged as on of today’s finest vocal recitalists. The Chœur de l’Orchestre de Paris also perform in three other works on the CD, the exquisite Pavane, with its flowing melody and mock-Rococo verses, and two early works to religious texts, the touching Cantique de Jean Racine and Super Flumina Babylonis (By the Rivers of Babylon).

Completing the programme is a purely instrumental work, the reflective, but impassioned Elégie for cello and orchestra, in which the soloist is the Orchestre de Paris’ Principal Cellist, Eric Picard.

Composer: Gabriel Fauré
Performer: Philippe Jaroussky, Matthias Goerne, Eric Picard
Conductor: Paavo Järvi
Orchestra/Ensemble: Orchestre de Paris, Orchestre de Paris Chorus

Reviews: "Järvi apparently subscribes to Delamarche’s belief, more or less, that the 1900 Trocadéro performance is the final word on the subject, so this is not the scaled-down 1893 Rutter version that has become popular in recent years. But unless my ears deceive me, it’s also not quite the “full monty” version heard at the Trocadéro either. I don’t, for example, hear flutes and clarinets, though in the big, massed climaxes with brass and organ blaring, it can be a bit hard to tell.

Let me hasten to add that I’m not criticizing the full orchestral treatment. It’s entirely viable and still well respected, enjoying many fine modern recordings. Unusual here, however, is Järvi’s inspired choice of a countertenor to sing the famous Pie Jesu instead of a boy or female soprano—inspired because Philippe Jaroussky’s voice and singing of the piece will give you goosebumps. For me, this is one aspect of Järvi’s disc that makes it indispensable, though I can’t say unique because I don’t know whether it has been done before or not.

Also to be noted is that though Järvi has considerable choral and orchestral forces at his command, he uses them judiciously and with restraint, resisting the temptation to beef up the score beyond Fauré’s unpretentious approach to the Requiem which, after all, abstains from the terrors of the Dies irae.

Järvi fills out his disc with the Cantique de Jean Racine, which is paired, almost de rigueur, with the Requiem, and the cello Elégie and Pavane, which are also frequent discmates in Fauré programs. But what makes Järvi’s CD unique as well as indispensable is its inclusion of a world premiere recording of Fauré’s Super flumina Babylonis (By the Rivers of Babylon). Written in 1863, the piece was Fauré’s third attempt to win the prestigious Prix de Rome, and for his effort, he got “a very honorable mention” but no cigar.

The work calls for five-part mixed chorus and is scored for an orchestra of winds in pairs, four horns, three trombones, timpani, and strings. Its text is drawn from Psalm 137, which begins with the Jews lamenting their exile from Jerusalem by the Babylonians and ends with their exulting in a fantasy of violent vengeance on their conquerors. If the music reminds you of Saint-Saëns, it should. Fauré was only 18 and still a student when he wrote it, and Saint-Saëns was one of his teachers. The piece may last only 10 minutes, but it’s almost worth the price of the disc by itself…there’s no question but that the new Järvi is strongly recommended."