Saint Saëns - December 2021, July 2011

[french frank]

1/5. Saint-Saëns was appointed organist at the Madeleine church in Paris at the age of just 22.

2/5. Relationships with and attitudes towards women.

3/5. Progression from maverick to establishment figure.

4/5. After a visit to Algiers, Saint-Saëns increasingly sought to escape the 'horrible North'.

5/5. Late works and concerns.

[3rd Viennese School]

The Patron Saint of Classical Music!

3VS

[Serial_Apologist]

The Patron Saint of Classical Music!

3VS

Yer joking?

From the little that I've read, he seems not to have been the most pleasant of individuals. How was it he described Cesar Franck's symphony? "Impotence, carried to the point of dogma"?

S-A

[vinteuil]

I like his friend Berlioz's comment - "Il sait tout, mais il manque d'inexpérience" ("He knows everything, but lacks inexperience").

[Roehre]

Yer joking?

From the little that I've read, he seems not to have been the most pleasant of individuals. How was it he described Cesar Franck's symphony? "Impotence, carried to the point of dogma"?

S-A

I didn't know this quote, but I like it

[Serial_Apologist]

I didn't know this quote, but I like it

I'd imagine this was partly a case of inter-composerly rivalry, sinced both composers shared broadly the same post-Schumann/post-Lisztian language. This is going to upset the Franckophiles: Franck could imv be a bit plodding at times; but I don't detect any of the more cringeworthy tendencies to be found in the music of Saint-Saens in HIS output.

[Suffolkcoastal]

Saint-Saens was actually a fascinating individual, a bit abrupt at times but no more than many other composers, and often generous, his support of Faure for example. He was also very forward thinking scientifically with an interest in astronomy and predicted that man would create a bomb that could instantly destroy a city!

[LeMartinPecheur]

Did S-S go on to suggest any cities?

Which towns or cities would boarders recommend for instant, ahem, deletion??

[Roslynmuse]

I'd imagine this was partly a case of inter-composerly rivalry, sinced both composers shared broadly the same post-Schumann/post-Lisztian language. This is going to upset the Franckophiles: Franck could imv be a bit plodding at times; but I don't detect any of the more cringeworthy tendencies to be found in the music of Saint-Saens in HIS output.

Interesting. I've warmed to Franck in recent years (particularly Psyche, which I find an achingly beautiful work.) I'd like to know what you find cringeworthy about S-S though - the most frequent response I experience is a sort of passive boredom with all the surface sparkle, with an occasional quickening of interest over some harmonic quirk or twist. Inspiration rarely seems to enter into it (but he could do it, all too rarely - Danse macabre, Le rouet d'Omphale, Carnaval des animaux (his masterpiece???) ). I remember being profoundly disappointed by Samson et Dalila.

[Serial_Apologist]

Interesting. I've warmed to Franck in recent years (particularly Psyche, which I find an achingly beautiful work.) I'd like to know what you find cringeworthy about S-S though - the most frequent response I experience is a sort of passive boredom with all the surface sparkle, with an occasional quickening of interest over some harmonic quirk or twist. Inspiration rarely seems to enter into it (but he could do it, all too rarely - Danse macabre, Le rouet d'Omphale, Carnaval des animaux (his masterpiece???) ). I remember being profoundly disappointed by Samson et Dalila.

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. Some commentators have claimed this Saint-Saens' finest work! Otherwise I agree with what you write. Given Saint-Saens's antipathy to Debussy, Le Carnaval does contain some remarkably advanced harmonies for when the piece was composed.

S-A

[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.