Chamber Music Prom 5 (30.08.21) - French Fancies

[Eine Alpensinfonie]

13:00 Monday 30 August 2021
Cadogan Hall

Camille Saint‐Saëns: Oboe Sonata
Ruth Gipps: Sea-Shore Suite
Henri Dutilleux: Oboe Sonata
Francis Poulenc: Oboe Sonata
Eugène Bozza: Fantaisie pastorale


François Leleux oboe
Eric Le Sage piano

A triptych of 20th-century sonatas by Saint-Saëns, Dutilleux and Poulenc forms the heart of this Anglo-French programme. The cool lines of Saint-Saëns’s neo-Classical sonata give way to the edgier, mercurial beauty of Dutilleux’s, while the Poulenc pays musical homage to its dedicatee, Sergey Prokofiev, ending with a ravishing lament. Eugène Bozza’s lyrical Fantaisie pastorale and Ruth Gipps’s vivid Sea-Shore Suite complete the recital.

[Eine Alpensinfonie]

I adore the Saint‐Saëns: Oboe Sonata, having played it for my Grade 8, back in 1968.

(It does have an extremely nasty top G in the finale, but it gave me the incentive to learn how to play it in context.)

[cloughie]

Is Ruth Gipps included to try to preserve a little entente cordiale or does being born in Bexhill count as being nearly in France?

[Eine Alpensinfonie]

Is Ruth Gipps included to try to preserve a little entente cordiale or does being born in Bexhill count as being nearly in France?

I remember being asked to write programme notes for a choral concert entitled "20th Century French Choral Music". It began with Faure's Cantique de Jean Racine!

[bluestateprommer]

Is Ruth Gipps included to try to preserve a little entente cordiale or does being born in Bexhill count as being nearly in France?

Well, in this instance, the geography gods have indulged in a bit of schedule-scrambling on Messrs. Leloux and Le Sage, as they appear unable to travel for this PCM next Monday. Olivier Stankiewicz and Huw Watkins are stepping into the breach, with the exact same program (*), at least as of this time. Earlier this summer, Huw Watkins and Helen Grime were unable to travel to Santa Fe for performances of their works at the Santa Fe Chamber Music Festival. So the wheel of fortune circles now a bit more for HW, in landing him this gig.

(*) PS (8/30/2021): Not the exact same program; see next post

[bluestateprommer]

Fine PCM today by Olivier Stankiewicz and Huw Watkins, maybe a little bit low-key (no pun intended) in spirit, and with the Eugène Bozza cut from the original program. But this is very understandable upon learning that OS is also playing with the Mahler Chamber Orchestra in today's RAH Prom as well. So, in other words, for OS' itinerary:

1. He performs the 1 PM Cadogan Hall PCM.
2. He has to get to the RAH for the Mahler CO rehearsal right after that.
3. He has to get back to Cadogan Hall for the 6 PM PCM.
4. He finally has to high-tail it back to the RAH for the 7:30 PM Mahler CO Prom.

This does make one wonder what OS was thinking when he accepted this emergency gig ;) , given the frantic scheduling, but never mind. (Maybe Nicholas Daniel or no other oboist was available.) But if nothing else, OS definitely this week's award for "hardest working musician at The Proms" for doing double-duty (triple-duty?) here.