Saint-Saens: Le Carnaval des Animaux, Septuor-Fantaisie, Camille Saint-Saëns (Composer), Renaud Capuçon (Performer), Gautier Capuçon (Performer), Emmanuel Pahud, Paul Meyer, Frank Braley, Michel Dalberto, David Guerrier, Marie-Pierre Langlamet, Florent Jodelet, Janne Saksala – This is a delightful record. It brings together some of Europe’s best musicians for a program of primarily unfamiliar works by Saint-Saëns which show him from his most playful, humorous side, and they clearly have a grand time. The only well-known work on the program, “The Carnival of the Animals,” is a portrait gallery juxtaposing the familiar with the exotic, and succeeds, by purely musical means, in evoking the salient characteristics of each creature with keen observation, psychological acumen, and benevolent wit. The Lion struts in a regal march, the Asses bray, the Birds twitter; the flute gives the Cuckoo’s drooping thirds great variety of expression, the Aquarium shimmers ethereally. Saint-Saëns, a brilliant pianist, even pokes fun at himself in a parody of two pianists practicing exercises in unison or contrary motion, but always slightly out of sync. He also did not scruple to borrow from his contemporaries for utmost effect: Tortoises shuffle to an Offenbach can-can, the Elephant dances to Berlioz’s Valse de Sylphs, the Finale, borrowing from Rossini’s Barber of Seville, is grandly operatic. “The Swan,” the work’s most familiar and only serious movement, is performed beautifully, with a touching, unsentimental simplicity. The “Fantasy for Violin and Harp,” a bravura piece for both instruments, alternates brilliant passages with dreamy, nostalgic lyricism. Three cello pieces are slow, songful, and passionate; the last is a very successful transcription of the famous aria from “Samson and Delilah.” All these works are played to the hilt for virtuosity, color, atmosphere, and expression. The Septet is another fun piece-whimsical, mischievous, comic. Everybody has lots of solos, especially the trumpet, whose virtuoso part mixes mock heroism with baroque flourishes. The Menuet is a courtly dance, the Trio a delicate love song; the slow movement is somber, the Finale a carefree romp.
Saint-Saëns was so fed up with the popularity of ‘Carnival of the Animals’, he stopped public performances of it in his lifetime (with the exception of The Swan; he probably realised there’d be a lynch mob of cellists at his front door within minutes if he tried to ban it). His Grand Zoological Fantasy has become a bit of a classical cliché, it’s true, but this new one from Virgin started winning me over the second I set eyes on the cover: an anthropomorphic band of musicians with animals heads in fancy dress which seems to owe something to the Beatles Sgt. Pepper. The grin widens when you see the players, some of the finest (mainly French) instrumentalists around, from the Capuçon brothers and Emmanuel Pahud to Michel Dalberto and Marie-Pierre Langlamet.
Right from the Introduction and Royal March of the Lion, this is obviously going to be fun; beautifully played, with real wit, and without crossing the invisible line into camp or exaggerated archness. It’s always respectful, and the impressions are as realistic as the score allows – no more. The tortoises funereal can-can is perfect. The elephant isn’t just a big, heavy bass solo.. pachyderm has muscles, and poise. The aquarium shimmers with life, and a glass harmonica adds a reflective sheen to the tank (Saint-Saëns actually just asked for harmonica, and no-one seems quite sure what precisely he meant). Having shown a stunning turn of speed as asses, the pianists practice their scales with lamentable precision..’s all very well balanced as well, with that wonderful sense of air around the instruments that makes all the difference in a chamber music recording.
But don’t just buy this for the Carnival; the other chamber works on offer here make generous and entirely appropriate couplings, especially the unusual Septet for piano, strings and..pet. As the song says, there are animals and animals and animals and animals, but breeding matters, and this Virgin’s pedigree is impeccable.
Andrew McGregor – presenter of CD Review on Radio 3
Like This? Try These:
Berlioz: Symphonie Fantastique (LSO/Davis)
Saint-Saëns:Complete Piano Music (CBSO/Hough)
opus number zoo: The Galliard Ensemble –Andrew McGregor
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