BaL 9.01.16 - Music by Henri Dutilleux

[Eine Alpensinfonie]

0930
Building a Library: Ivan Hewett surveys recordings of music by Henri Dutilleux, a composer with a unique voice who took inspiration from the tradition of Ravel, Debussy and Roussel, but created a sound world of sensuous harmony and colour that was all his own.

Take your pick:

Au gré des ondes
Bergerie
Blackbird
Chanson de la déportée
Chansons de bord Tome1, TomeII
Choral, Cadence et Fugato for trombone & piano
Correspondances for Soprano and Orchestra
D’ombre et de silence
Figures de résonances
Homage à Paul Sacher
L'Arbre des songes (Concerto for violin and orchestra)
La Fille du Diable: extracts from the film score
La Geôle
Le Loup
Le Loup – fragments symphoniques
Le Temps l’horloge
Les Citations
Mélodies
Metaboles
Mini-prélude en eventail
Mystère de l'instant
Oboe Sonata
Petit air à dormer debout
Piano Sonata
Préludes
Résonances
San Francisco Night
Sarabande et Cortège
Sonatine for flute & piano
Sonnets by Jean Cassou
String Quartet ‘Ainsi la nuit'
Sur le même accord (nocturne)
Symphony No. 1
Symphony No. 2 'Le Double'
The Shadows of Time
Timbres, espace, mouvement - La nuit etoilée
Tous les chemins ... mènent à Rome
Tout un monde lointain (Concerto for cello and orchestra)
Tout un monde lointain (Concerto for cello and orchestra): Enigme
Trois Sonnets de Jean Cassou
Trois strophes sur le nom de Sacher
Trois Tableaux symphoniques d’après Les Hauts de Hurlevent

[LeMartinPecheur]

I trust Mr Hewitt will be true to the BaL format and tell us which one of these is the best!

Don't really feel I've yet hit paydirt in my limited mining of M. Dutilleux. The shelves reveal Correspondences; L'arbre des songes; the Oboe Sonata; (Deux, pas Trois) Sonnets de Paul Cassou; Timbres, espace, mouvement; Tout un monde lointain (2 versions); and ditto for The Shadows of Time.

So I hope Mr Hewitt will produce a magic key...

[Serial_Apologist]

Many thanks for the advance notice, EA.

I hadn't realised Dutilleux's output to have been that big, there being several works in that list (presumably early) that I hadn't heard of; interesting too to see Le Loup in two places, the former reference presumably being to the whole ballet score, which one understood the composer had debarred from performance in its entirety, displeased with his product. The only bits I've heard are lovely imv; they may be more derivative than the other music he was composing by that time, but since the derivations are stylistically from other composers whose work I love, he's to be forgiven in my book!

[Roslynmuse]

Quite a lot of the music listed in the OP is either very short or very early, or both; as regards the Deux/Trois Sonnets, there is a third one (unpublished) which was given a performance last year, I think, entitled Eloignez-vous http://data.bnf.fr/14797920/henri_du...e_jean_cassou/. In due course one would hope that Durand will issue it and someone will record it. There is a complete (?) recording of Le Loup in this box - http://www.cdandlp.com/en/dutilleux-...-5/r116673293/ - an elderly recording with a narration in French. As far as I'm aware there's only one recording of Chanson de la déportée (rather like Poulenc in La grenouillere mode) and of San Francisco Night (Dawn Upshaw) and only the second book of Chansons de bord have been recorded. Homage a Paul Sacher and the Trois Strophes are the same piece, I think, and Enigme is one movement from Tout un monde lointain. The 'mélodies' are a set of 4, the 'préludes' a set of three. I haven't come across recordings of the film scores or the Tableaux. The piece that really turned me on to Dutilleux's music was Metaboles - a wonderfully satisfying piece - and then I loved the violin concerto and the string quartet. Someone described him as 'the Laura Ashley of contemporary music', but however attractive the surface of the music is, I think there's great integrity and - in the best pieces - real energy and vitality. I remember hearing Y-P Tortelier conduct many of the orchestral works with the BBC Phil when he was their principal conductor and the recordings they made at that time are very fine.

[Roslynmuse]

Correction - I've just checked my disc of Chansons de bord (coupled with Britten's Golden Vanity and Daniel-Lesur's Chansons populaires) and there are excerpts from both volumes, ten songs in total. The disc only lasts 49' so it's frustrating that the opportunity to record an intégrale was not taken.

Incidentally, there are a couple of other short pieces that have not yet appeared on CD - Slava's Fanfare for spatial ensemble (1997) (performed at the Proms a couple of years ago), and Hommage à Nadia Boulanger, for soprano, 3 violas, clarinet, percussion and zither (1967).

[jayne lee wilson]

Dutilleux, c'est mon reve familier....

Give us a break, just having morning coffee....much Dutilleux on my shelves & drives... might come back on this later...

[BBMmk2]

Looking forward to your comments Jayne!

I love HD's music, very much, so looking forward to this.

[Roslynmuse]

And another update - a new CD on BIS includes Trois Sonnets, Quatre mélodies (orchestral versions), Le Loup, Tableaux and La fille du diable. Reviewed in this month's Gramophone.

[Eine Alpensinfonie]

Just bumping this thread. So far, there hasn't been much discussion. In my case, it's because I know virtually nothing about this composer. I'm hoping this will be changed by the BaL broadcast tomorrow.

[teamsaint]

Just had a flick through the Presto Classical listings.

In addition to the several box sets that are available, there are a lot of CDs available with works by other composers as well as Dutilleux, many of which look very tempting.

might be good if he guides us towards some of the best of these.

which isn't really the point.
But I'm not really sure there is a point this week really. Hope I'm wrong.

[oddoneout]

I know virtually nothing about this composer.

Moi aussi, although I'm afraid that as a result of one of those silly family jokes that happen in even the best circles his name is all too familiar, having been 'translated' into Duty Lurks. He doesn't even exist as far as my copy of Percy Scholes is concerned.

[Nick Armstrong]

There's a element of irony in the coincidence that this survey falls in the week when so many thoughts are on the late Pierre Boulez (who will feature in the segment immediately after BAL, and indeed in the programme immediately after Record Review) - Henri Dutilleux apparently suffered more than somewhat at the hands of the younger Pierre:

http://www.overgrownpath.com/2013/05/boulez-greeted-him-by-turning-his-back.html

http://www.theguardian.com/music/2005/apr/28/classicalmusicandopera1

[ardcarp]

...and his dates, which I've just looked up, are b.1916 d.2013

[richardfinegold]

I think I have a Rostropovich recording of a Concerto in my lp collection somewhere

[jayne lee wilson]

A certain Mass in B Minor and some Boulez retrospectives having gotten in the way, I've only looked closely at Dutilleux Symphony No.2 so far. But it was soon obvious that one of the latest is also the greatest, to wit:

Seattle SO/Ludovic Morlot. 24/96 Seattle Symphony Media. c/w L'Arbre des Songes & Metaboles. (Augustin Hadelich is ASTOUNDING in Tree of Dreams; SQ beggars description).
As the same team have already released:
Symphony No.1. Tout un Monde Lointain. Shadows of Time. 24/96 Seattle Symphony Media.
- And this is outstanding too, there's your luxury-buy capsule-collection Dutilleux right there, in state-of-the-art sound - important for a composer of such instrumental, rhythmic & colouristic subtlety.

Having always hymned the qualities of the 4-disc Chandos Complete Orchestral Music with BBCPO/Tortelier, I was a little abashed to find their recording of Le Double sounding rather distant and, at lower levels, expressively anonymous compared to the subtlety, power, thrilling scale & spaciousness of Morlot in hi-res. Tortelier is not bad at all (the 4-disc set still a fine buy), but the best is the enemy of the good.
Bychkov with the Orchestre de Paris (c/w Timbres Espaces Mouvement and Metaboles) came across very well too - a little tauter and more dramatic than the Morlot, in excellent 1992 Philips sound, and with an especially clear concertante group; but the beauty, scale and subtlety of both the Seattle albums, the bar-by-bar sensitivity of the playing, are in a class of their own, and probably more rewarding to live with. Anyway, why have only one?

As for the supposed classic - Lamoureux/Munch on Erato, in fairly refined sound for 1967 Paris - yes, texture, dynamic attack and French orchestral character is ungainsayable (brilliant trumpets!) but I find it overdriven in the animato, with a murkily indistinct concertante group whose oboe & clarinet have distinctly insecure intonation. (I began to hear the Bychkov reading as an improved Munch-remake). Listening to the Munch finale, then the transparent, atmospheric Morlot back-to-back made vividly clear the need for beautiful sound in this music, and Morlot brings out the dance-rhythms with marvellously light and bouyant touch.

There's clearly something goin' on when Morlot plays Dutilleux in Seattle. He has a very special feeling - a close identification - with this composer.

http://www.qobuz.com/gb-en/album/dutilleux-metaboles-larbre-des-songes-symphony-no-2-le-double-ludovic-morlot-seattle-symphony-orchestra/0855404005072

http://www.qobuz.com/gb-en/album/henri-dutilleux-symphony-no-1-tout-un-monde-lointain-the-shadows-of-time-xavier-phillips-ludovic-morlot/0855404005003