Florent Schmitt’s early composition Soirs, composed between 1890 and 1896 and published by Durand in 1911. Schmitt later orchestrated eight of the ten preludes.
Most music lovers who know the works of French composer Florent Schmitt are most familiar with his compositions dating from the early 1900s onward.
Far less known are the numerous works Schmitt created in the years before his startling and celebrated Psaume XLVII, which was composed in 1904 in Rome and premiered in 1906 in Paris.
Even today, many of Schmitt’s earliest compositions have yet to be recorded commercially, although a number of them including the Quatre pièces and the Chant du soir for violin and piano, the Andante & Scherzo for harp and string quartet, the Scherzo-Pastorale for flute and piano, and the Prière for organ have at last received their recording premieres within the past several years.
However, there is one early work by Schmitt that has been in the record catalogs for years. It’s Soirs, Opus 5, consisting of ten preludes for piano composed in 1890-1896 when Schmitt was between 20 and 26 years of age (although the score wouldn’t actually be published until 1911).
Being such early pieces, they inhabit a sound-world vastly different from the compositions of Schmitt that most people know.
Listening to these preludes, one can easily discern the influence of Frédéric Chopin and Robert Schumann — as well as Gabriel Fauré, who was Schmitt’s beloved teacher and mentor at the Paris Conservatoire.
The ten preludes bear descriptive titles redolent of the prevailing salon piano literature of the day:
- En rêvant (Dreaming)
- Gaity (Gaiety)
- Spleen (Melancholy)
- Après l’été (After the Summer)
- Parfum exotique (Exotic Fragrance)
- Un soir (An Evening)
- Tziganiana (Gypsy Style)
- Eglogue (Idyll)
- Sur l’onde (On the Wave)
- Dernières pages (Last Pages)
But of course, they are far more than mere salon miniatures. The musicologist Eric Berman captures the essence of Schmitt’s suite well when he states:
“The title [Soirs] quite remarkably defines it: A nostalgic atmosphere and a feeling which is very close to romanticism hangs over the whole composition. The influence of Chopin is undeniable, but the preludes already have the stamp of a master …
The themes are beautiful, with minor tonalities prevailing. This very intimate music appeals directly to the soul without any artificial means. It also has a certain innocence which makes it both charming and fascinating.”
Only commercial recording of the original piano version of Soirs: Francisco Manuele (Cybelia label, late 1980s).
The piano suite has been recorded commercially just once, performed by pianist Francisco Manuele and released on the Cybelia label in the 1980s.
As he would also do with many of his other piano compositions, several years afterward Schmitt prepared an orchestral version of Soirs, omitting two of the preludes (Tziganiana and Dernières pages) and reordering the remaining eight.
The orchestral version of Soirs has been recorded twice — first by James Lockhart and the Rhenish Philharmonic Orchestra on the Cybelia label in the 1980s, and later by David Robertson and the Orchestre Philharmonique de Monte-Carlo, released in 1994 on the Valois label.
Essayist and music critic Benoït Duteurtre has remarked on Schmitt’s orchestral version of this music as follows:
“The light orchestration shows the consummate talent of the student, his capacity for simplicity and naturalness, which preceded the scholarly elaborations of his mature years.”
David Robertson’s recording of Florent Schmitt’s orchestral version of Soirs, with the Monte-Carlo Philharmonic Orchestra (Valois label, 1994).
The Robertson/Monte-Carlo recording has been uploaded to YouTube in two parts, which you can listen to here and here.
Because of its multi-movement structure, the various preludes making up Soirs are sometimes performed by pianists and orchestras individually or in smaller groups rather than as the entire suite. Along these lines, four of the preludes will be performed in concert in Tokyo on September 6, 2015 by the Orchestre Français du Japon.
Daijiro Ukon conducts the Orchestre Français du Japon.
The OFJ was formed in 2013 with the express purpose of performing French music for audiences in Japan. Music professor and Ravel specialist Arbie Orenstein of Queens College played a major role as artistic advisor during the orchestra’s formation, which performed its first concert earlier this year under its music director Daijiro Ukon in works by Faure, Ravel and Honegger.
The OFJ concert performance will include En rêvant, Gaiety, Parfum exotique and Sur l’onde from Soirs, in addition to music by three other French composers (Debussy, Ravel and Milhaud).
Devotees of Florent Schmitt who are in Japan and East Asia should make the effort to attend the concert because, to my knowledge, this is the only live performance of Schmitt’s orchestral music that will be occurring in the Far East in the upcoming concert season.
