In my
review of
what I might now call part one of this journey, the music of
Chopin, born in 1810, was chosen as an appropriate background
to the wonderful pictures. Although Chopin was the son of a French
father and a Polish mother he spent his early life in Poland
before leaving in 1830 and setting up home in Paris where he
died in 1849. I found the choice of his second piano concerto
somewhat strange and not particularly appropriate for the pictures.
Strangely, there was no coverage at all of the Limousin area,
and particularly the scenic village of
Gargilesse-Dampiere
where the composer conducted his affair with the novelist Georges
Sands and which also drew many painters including Claude Monet
and Théodore Rousseau. The music really seemed purely
background and bore little thematic or emotional relationship
with what was being shown. In this second volume the music of
the very French composer Gabriel Fauré is chosen and a
definite effort seems to have been made to match the music to
the visual locations.
Fauré was a pupil of Saint-Saens at the Ecole Niedermeyer
in Paris before becoming assistant organist at St Sulpice, later
moving to the Madeleine. The latter is a dark forbidding building
on the route from the Seine past the magnificent façade
of the Palais Garnier to the Boulevard Haussemann in that district
renovated with so much wonderful architecture under the Second
Empire. At the Madeleine Fauré became deputy to Saint-Saëns
and subsequently Choirmaster. There he wrote a large number of
songs. In 1892 he became inspector of French provincial conservatories
and four years later principal organist at the Madeleine. In
the same year he at last found employment as a teacher of composition
at the Conservatoire after the death of the old director Ambroise
Thomas, who had found Fauré too much of a modernist.
Fauré became director of the Conservatoire in 1905, a
position he held until 1920. His pupils there included Ravel,
Enescu and Nadia Boulanger. His musical language bridged a gap
between the romanticism of the nineteenth century and the more
modern, but tonal music of the twentieth century and is characterised
by his
gift for melody and a particularly personal manner, as the accompanying
leaflet puts it. The initial version of his
Requiem was
first performed at the Madeleine in 1888, its five movements
later expanded and with a final version published in 1901.
The sub-title of this photographic collection,
Cathedrals
and Megaliths, Calvaries and Tapestries from Brittany to the
Loire, is, to say the least, somewhat understated in respect
of the geography and content. In reality its coverage extends
to the Comté in the Jura in the far east of France. Whilst
the content initially focuses on churches and holy places it
also takes in the remoteness of the Grande Briere in the South
of Brittany and the rocky archipelago of the Isles de Chaussey
an hour’s sail off the coast of Normandy. There are pastoral
scenes, a yacht journey and lovely evenings and sunsets as well
as a tour of Honfleur in Normandy.
Given the title there are few better places to start than the
mighty Cathedral atop the city of
Chartres, sitting on
the river Eure (Chapter 1). The imposing west front of this
thirteenth century church is matched by the awesome carvings
and stained glasswork seen from the inside. In the seventeenth
century a canal some 36 miles long was built from La Grande Briere,
that strange marshland at the south of Brittany so as to link
the Loire with the Seine. There are fine evening views of the
1890 aqueduct constructed to take the canal over the river. The
Introit
and Kyrie form an atmospheric accompaniment.
Chapter 2 moves into Brittany proper, a region of many appropriate
monuments, particularly in the west of Finistere. These include
the grand church at Pleyben with its calvaire and the more famous
one at Locranon with views of its church and cemetery. Further
south are
Les alignements, the megaliths of Carnac, now
a World Heritage Site. These date from the fifth millennium BC
and extend for a distance of six kilometres. Thirty years ago
I could wander among then, nowadays they are fenced off. A lingering
panoramic view could have shown their extent, close-ups do not
catch the flavour of the place. One can still wonder among Les
géants at Kerzerho, just north of Carnac where the large
upright stones live up to their name and are a wonder to behold.
In his Requiem Fauré avoids the terrors of the Day of
Judgement familiar from the traditional
Dies irae. The
general mood is one of tranquillity and hope. The Offertory,
its text slightly adapted, was one of the two movements added
to the original work, which was developed with changed instrumentation
and a baritone soloist. The
Offertoire catches the mood
here well.
Chapter 3 moves on to Burgundy and some pictures of the mighty
Basilica of Ste-Marie-Madeleine at Vezelay that were included
in the previous DVD. Its hilltop location was once the site of
an important Benedictine abbey. The church was restored in the
nineteenth century and remains an example of Romanesque architecture
in what was once an important place of pilgrimage. The
Sanctus catches
the mood well, the beauty enhanced by the solo violin against
the texture of lower strings.
Chapter 4 is now in the far east of France to the Franche-Comté in
the Jura. The church of Notre Dame du Haut at Ronchamp was built
after the Second World War, during which the original had been
destroyed. Designed by Le Corbusier it is notable by its distinct
break with tradition and its interior lit by the shafts of light
that penetrate through apertures in the concrete walls. The unfamiliarity
of the architecture is contrasted by the
Pie Jesu with
its soprano or treble solo being among the most familiar and
best loved movements.
Chapter 5 has us back in the Pays de la Loire and the Musée
Jean Lurcat at Angers and where Le Salle des malades of the Hôpital
St-Jean, dating from the twelfth century, now houses the large
Aubusson tapestries completed in 1966. With their vivid colours
these are most impressive as are the caves at Deneze-sous-Doue
near Angers which contain a hundred or more carved figures dating
from the sixteenth century.
The setting of the
Agnus Dei includes a reference to the
opening
Requiem aeternam, and continues the prevailing
mood of devotional tranquillity.
Chapter 6 takes the viewer back to the Comté and Les Salines,
the historic salt works at Salins-les-Bains. Regrettably the
focus is on the pumping machinery rather than on any views of
the setting of curved architecture. Somewhat strangely the representation
is cut in with glimpses of the remarkable polyptych of
The
Last Judgement by Roger van der Weyden, painted for the Hotel-Dieu
in Beaune and depicting the Archangel Michael weighing the souls
of the dead and various religious and contemporary figures. This
was included in the previous issue, which also showed the hospital
interior and the patterned roofs of that unique town. Also included
are views of the thirteenth-century church of Notre Dame in Dijon
the West front facade of which is decorated with grotesque animal
and human figures. The music chosen is the
Libera me,
which includes the baritone solo who could have been steadier.
Chapter 7 is back in Normandy at the Hambye and Jumieges abbeys.
The latter, now in ruins, was founded
in the seventh century. The surviving buildings date from the
eleventh century and owe much to Abbot Robert II, who became
Archbishop of Canterbury in 1051. The Benedictine abbey of Hambye,
near Coutances, was founded in the twelfth century, and is an
early example of Norman Gothic. The flying buttresses and louring
skies also have all too many English connections! The concluding
In
paradisum is an appropriate piece in a continuing mood of
tranquillity.
Chapter 8 is still focused on Normandy and is accompanied by
Fauré’s elegiac
Pavane. It focuses on the
quayside of Honfleur at night and characteristic streets bordered
by timbered houses in the day. In my experience, during the summer,
quayside boats are atop with poseur tourists eating their large
plateau
de fruits de mer and quaffing Muscadet or Champagne. There
are views of a sunset at Etretat but no views of the rock formations
on the shore. The church of St Catherine, built by shipwrights
in the fifteenth century, is said to resemble an upturned ship.
Chapter 9 plays out to one of Fauré’s less well
known pieces,
Sicilienne, Op. 78 that has enjoyed a wide
variety of arrangements. Written for cello and piano it is dedicated
to the English cellist W.H. Squire and orchestrated as incidental
music. The camera takes in the richness of the countryside with
its farms, orchards and glimpses of half-timbered thatched houses.
The verdant pasture explains why Normandy is able to sustain
cattle and is the home of cream-based cuisine, its colour and
climate reminiscent of England, having a fair ration of rain.
One has to travel south of the Loire to see the grass somewhat
more sparse and less green.
Chapter 10 at first seems a rather strange choice in an issue
that stresses religious connotations. But many of the contents
also have a peacefulness of setting; none more so than this with
a yacht visiting Bes de Chausey. The archipelago of Chausey,
with its multitude of rocky islets, is some miles off the Normandy
resort of Granville with an actual voyage taking some fifty minutes,
and also demanding skill in navigation. The sail out there is
accompanied by Fauré’s
Berceuse, Op. 16.
The musical performances are more than satisfactory and add an
ideal extra dimension to the images. I imagine there may well
be further DVD instalments in this journey. France has four times
the land mass of Britain so there is plenty of scope. If so,
and the music is appropriate an accompaniment as here then I
shall look forward to their issue with eager anticipation.
Robert J Farr
Lisa Beckley, (soprano)
Nicholas Gedge, (bass-baritone); with Colm Carey (organ). Schola
Cantorum
of Oxford and Oxford Camerata/Jeremy Summerly fom Naxos 8.550765 
[77.56] 
