This bids fair to be the start of a mandatory collection for vocal collectors. It’s the first of a French tenors series from Marston, and this inaugurating volume includes the complete recordings of two important figures - Émile Scaramberg and Pierre Cornubert, and selected recordings made by Julien Leprestre. All were made in a roughly two-year period between 1905 and 1906. 

Scaramberg (1863-1938) studied in Paris and made in his debut in 1893 and was soon singing at the most important French houses. By 1896-97 he was partnering Melba at Nice and making his Covent Garden debut. He sang new repertoire, Wagner, the first modern revival of Gluck’s Armide and much else besides. His career ended in early 1907 with the onset of what the booklet notes describe as ‘vocal difficulties’ so we are fortunate that he made as many recordings as he did in his prime. 

Curious to see what Michael Scott had to say about Scaramberg in his book, and remembering vaguely that it wasn’t pleasant, I discovered that he’d actually called him ‘pedestrian…and provincial’. Since the tenor was a major figure and his records are collectable it would have been educative to know how many sides Scott listened to before coming to this utterly dismissive and frankly wretched summary. It’s hard to know what could lead one to such an assessment. Scaramberg’s Manon is actually quite scrupulous – there are two takes of Ah! Fuyez. Since Scott also alleged that the tenor had no legato it’s necessary to cite the aria from Gounod’s La Reine de Saba for just this quality – and for an impressive theatrical presence as well, unforced and dramatic. On this evidence he was a natural and unaffected Wagner singer suffering not at all from German-Wagnerian-tenorial barks such as afflicted a number of his colleagues across the border. His Faust is cultured and in the best French style full of a strong narrative sense and a vivid head voice. In the extracts from Roméo et Juliette his soprano partner is the uncommunicative and rather noncommittal Georgette Bréjean-Silver. His Rigoletto may not be technically watertight but it has a raffish air and is stylish and not done down by any gauche gestures. He sounds like a born studio artist in fact. We are faced with small abundances here as there are multiple recordings of the Siciliana from Cavalleria Rusticana – two takes with piano accompaniment, one with instrumental. 

Pierre Cornubert (1863-1922) was a Parisian. His debut came in 1887 and though he sang principally in France, in the 1899-1900 season he sang in Havana and Mexico City, followed by appearances at the Met  (in L’Africaine and Roméo amongst others). Other performances are noted at Covent Garden, Warsaw and Antwerp. His was perhaps not as dramatic or strong a voice as Scaramberg’s but on the evidence of these fifteen sides (two on cylinder) he was just as stylish an exponent of the French repertoire in particular. The phrasing and compass of his Pays merveilleux!...Ô paradis! are both very fine and if there’s a touch of strain in his Roméo compensation comes from its idiomatic strength. True his exploration into aria antiche is not a success  - Plaisir d’amour is lugubrious. But he is back on safe ground when he essays Massenet’s Ouvre tes yeux bleus which he sings with considerable subtlety sand stylistic assurance. The more heroic and dramatic side of his singing can be gauged from Boieldieu’s charmingly spick and span Ah, quel plaisir d’être soldat from La Dame Blanche which is conveyed with real élan. 

The third tenor is Julien Leprestre (1864-1909). He died only three years after making these sides – we have a selection of six from the eleven he made. He sang frequently at the Opéra-Comique and indeed being the least well known of the triumvirate booklet writer Vincent Giroud goes into extensive detail as to the performances throughout his sadly truncated career. The notes by the way are fully up to the usual exalted biography-and-analysis standard set by this company. Leprestre has the warmest and perhaps most immediately appealing of the three voices documented. His vibrato was quite quick but the timbre of the voice is, I think, preferable to Cornubert’s. He sings with finely characterised intelligence, is personable, and immediately attractive. It’s clearly an injustice that he has been so relatively forgotten in relation to his better-known contemporaries. 

As long as Marston choose so wisely and so well, annotate with such generosity, transfer with such assiduous intelligence and package their product with such well chosen photographs then they will have ready adherents for what are some of the most consistently inspiring historical discs now before the public. 

Jonathan Woolf

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