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LES SIECLES
SEASON
François-Xavier ROTH
2014-2015
BERLIOZ
BERLIOZ, Symphonie Fantastique
BERLIOZ, Ouverture de Benvenuto Cellini
BERLIOZ, Nuits d’été - Anna Caterina Antonacci
or BERLIOZ, Harold en Italie – Tabea Zimmermann, alto
The great loves of Berlioz’s life were such an inspiration throughout his lifetime that they
became an integral part of his work. This man, who showed such fierce determination to
make progress in music revealed a surprising fragility in his relationships with women.
Inextricably linked to his music, they were often both his muses and interpreters. Two
works that highlight these close relationships are the Symphonie Fantastique premiered
in Paris on 5 December 1830 and Les Nuits d’été, orchestrated in 1856.
The first of these works was a passionate declaration of love to Harriet Smithson. In September 1827,
Berlioz had seen this Irish actress perform the role of Ophelia in Hamlet at the Odeon Theatre and had
fallen in love at first sight. However it wasn’t until five years later that he was to meet and eventually
marry her.
This originally unrequited love and its torments are at the heart of Symphonie Fantastique. This revolutionnary masterpiece depicts the artist as the victim of love. This character, poisoned by opium, dreams
of his own execution before dancing in hell the Round of the Sabbath.
Les Nuits d’été also mixes fantastical imagery of death and eternal love. Berlioz chose a cycle of six poems
by Théophile Gauthier, published in 1838 in La Comédie de la Mort. Here again Berlioz’s romantic
relationship became inextricably linked to his composition. Marie Recio, the second wife of Berlioz was
the first to lend her voice to this music when she premiered the fourth song in the cycle, Absence in 1843.
COMMEMORATION 1914- 1918 / BEETHOVEN-CAVANNA
Bernard CAVANNA (1951 - ), Karl Koop Konzert – Pascal Contet, accordéon
Ludwig van BEETHOVEN (1770 – 1827), Symphonie n°7
Ludwig van BEETHOVEN (1770 – 1827), La Victoire de Wellington
To commemorate the centenary of the beginning of World War One, a conflict
which profoundly marked Europe, François-Xavier Roth and Les Siècles have brought together works by
Bernard Cavanna, a contemporary French composer (also the grandson of a German soldier who was a
prisoner of the Great War), and the universally renound, Beethoven, who has become a symbol of Europe
at peace.
Beethoven’s Seventh Symphony was premiered in Vienna on 8 December 1813, at a charity concert with
Beethoven himself conducting. The program opened with Beethoven’s patriotic Wellington’s Victory, a
musical tableau depicting the defeat of Napoleon’s army against the British troops in June 1813. This
historic concert was to honour the Austrian and Bavarian soldiers wounded in the Battle of Hanau, a
decisive and violent conflict that had rocked Europe, a century before World War One.
Bernard Cavanna’s piece is an accordion concerto composed in tribute to his grandfather, Karl Koop. The
latter was a German mine-clearing expert during the Great War, taken prisoner by the English in 1918 near
Laon.
Karl Koop had the good luck to receive an accordion from the Red Cross, which he taught himself to play
by ear. He used this to earn a living for himself and his family by playing for balls. In the spirit of Les
Siècles’s ambition to offer a new approach to presenting concerts through mixing modern and period
perfomance this concert will be performed on period instruments for Beethoven’s Seventh Symphony and
modern instruments for Bernard Cavanna’s accordion concerto. The Cavanna piece will include the use of
both a modern accordion and and accordion from the 1930’s.
BERLIOZ, ROMEO & JULIETTE
BERLIOZ, Romeo & Juliette
Isabelle Druet, mezzo-soprano / Jean-François Borras, ténor / Nicolas Courjal, baryton-basse
In partnership with Philharmonie de Paris, Les Siècles play the dramatic symphony of Hector Berlioz :
Romeo & Juliette. The play of William Shakespeare has marked Berlioz in all the aspects of his life. His
dramatic symphony depicts the myth of Verone’s lovers and express all the emotion in this tragic love
story. This work remains one of the masterpiece of the production of the great Hector Berlioz. Les Siècles
strictly respect the staging wishes of the composer : The choir singers representing the Capulets and
Montagues are installed in front of the orchestra, as true theatrical characters.
SIBELIUS-DEBUSSY
DEBUSSY, Prélude à l’après-midi d’un Faune
SIBELIUS, Concerto pour violon – Tedi Papavrami, violon
SIBELIUS, Pelléas et Mélisande
DEBUSSY, La Mer
To celebrate the 150th anniversary of the birth of the great Finnish composer Jean Sibelius, Les Siècles and
Francois Xavier Roth have chosen to present his work in a new light, by programming it side by side with
works by his French contemporary, the famous Claude Debussy.
Claude Debussy and Sibelius, born respectively in 1862 and 1865, met for the first time on February 27,
1909 at a Proms concert given at the Queen’s Hall, London. Sibelius had directed his music shortly before
and had come to listen to the Nocturnes and Prélude à l’après-midi d’un Faune. He noted in his diary: «Met
Debussy. Interesting. Compliments ... he bombarded me with compliments ‘en français’. It literally
rained.” In a letter to his wife Aïno, Sibelius says,” Yesterday I went to hear Debussy and got to know him
[...] A close relationship was immediately established between us.” Thanks to Ferruccio Busoni, Sibelius
had discovered the Nocturnes in 1904 and following this promoted Debussy’s work in Finland, where later
his string quartet was premiered in 1907.
Both composers in their respective countries were seen to represent a musical nationalism. They also
shared an interest in the work of the Belgian playwright Maurice Maeterlinck. Sibelius composed
incidental music for Maeterlinck’s play and Debussy was inspired to write his famous opera Pelléas et
Mélisande after this work. Debussy’s opera was premiered on the 30 April, 1902 at the Opera Comique in
Paris. Sibelius’s incidental music was premiered on March 17th 1905 and following its success was repeated
around fifteen times throughout that year. It was also in this year that both Debussy and Sibelius were
featured in the Concerts Lamoureux. Under the direction of Camille Chevillard, Sibelius’s The Swan of
Tuonela and Debussy’s La Mer received their French premieres.
In March 2013, Les Siècles released a recording with La Mer by Debussy and a world premiere : the
Première Suite d’Orchestre.
These two pieces are recorded on period instruments. The Première Suite is a young work that provided
an extremely lively and interesting testimony of the harmonic and aesthetic soundscape and style of his
formative musical years.