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Duni: Le peintre amoureux de son modèle - Les deux chasseurs et la laitière

Orkester Nord

Opera - Released October 6, 2023 | Aparté

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The composer Egidio Duni is all but unknown nowadays, but he worked amidst several important currents of 18th century musical life. A Neapolitan who wrote Italian operas, he was backed by a noble patron who apparently gave him the means to move to Paris. Duni composed French operas of various types, and Denis Diderot cited him as a counterexample to Rousseau's contention that the French language was unsuited to opera. Duni would be worth hearing for his influence alone; the two short comic works recorded here were important early examples of opéra-comique, but they are also charming in their own right. In Paris, they were known not as operas but as "comédies melées d'ariettes," or comedies mixed with ariettas. Much of the dialogue is spoken, and some of that is unaccompanied, while other pieces have a light continuo-like backing. (This aspect of the notation has not survived, but the decisions made by the performers here are unobjectionable.) The texts hold up even today as pretty funny. Le peintre amoureux de son modèle ("The Painter in Love with His Model," she chooses someone her own age at the end) and Les deux chasseurs et la laitière ("The Two Hunters and the Milkmaid") have crackling sitcom dialogue. Physical album buyers will get a booklet with complete texts. The singers are not spectacular (four in one opera, three in the other), but then, they shouldn't be; what is important is that they put the text across, don't overact, and engage with the comedy. The small Orkester Nord is the right size at 23 players, and conductor Martin Wåhlberg keeps things moving along. This is a delightful release of much more than historical interest. If scores are available, collegiate groups could easily mount productions of these works.© James Manheim /TiVo
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Chéri coco

Thomas Pitiot

French Music - Released April 30, 2021 | L'Océan Nomade

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Je me perds

Boisier

French Music - Released May 26, 2023 | Un Par Un Communications

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Je me perds

Boisier

Dance - Released July 14, 2023 | Un Par Un Communications

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Ravel: L'Heure espagnole - Bolero

François-Xavier Roth

Opera - Released June 16, 2023 | harmonia mundi

Hi-Res Booklet Distinctions Choc de Classica
The main attraction of the orchestra Les Siècles and its conductor François-Xavier Roth is its use of period instruments from around 1900, the time period in which the group specializes. One could hardly ask for a better demonstration record (as audiophiles used to call them) than this take on Maurice Ravel's L'Heure espagnole, an edgy, rather tawdry but undeniably funny little opera about the extramarital escapades of a clockmaker's wife, complete with excellent satirical characterizations of her two lovers. The opera receives a pitch-perfect performance here from a quintet of younger singers, who deliver the kind of dry, close-to-spoken singing Ravel wanted. Even better, though, is the orchestral sound, where the opera's large contingent of winds, brass, and percussion displays the sound of Les Siècles at its most vivid. The score calls for trios of oboes, clarinets, and bassoons, and these all have a tangier sound than modern instruments provide. The program ends with Boléro, and this, too, stands out from among the hundreds or thousands of other recordings on the market. Ravel had very fixed ideas about how he wanted the work to sound, and he wrangled with Arturo Toscanini, who conducted the premiere in New York, about it: it should be played absolutely straight, with no variation in tempo and little expression. Notwithstanding the connotations that became attached to the work later on, he viewed it as an abstract work, and that is exactly what it becomes in Roth's bracing reading. Listeners who have been wanting to sample Roth's work with this orchestra are enthusiastically encouraged to try this release, which made classical best-seller charts in the summer of 2023.© James Manheim /TiVo

Brol La Suite

Angèle

French Music - Released October 5, 2018 | Universal Music Distribution Deal

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Grand lièvre

Jean-Louis Murat

French Music - Released October 17, 2011 | [PIAS] Le Label

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Recorded in the South of France with producers Fred Jimenez and Stephane Reynaud, enigmatic French singer/songwriter Jean-Louis Murat's 21st studio album, Grand Lièvre, eschews the blues-rock of its 2009 predecessor, Le Cours Ordinaire des Choses, in favor of a more alternative direction inspired by American indie bands Swell and Silver Jews. A special edition featuring a bonus eight-track live album, entitled Live à la Coopé, was also later released. © Jon O'Brien /TiVo

D'un papillon à une étoile

Véronique Sanson

French Music - Released January 1, 1999 | Parlophone (France)

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Entre ciment et belle étoile

Keny Arkana

Hip-Hop/Rap - Released October 16, 2006 | Because Music

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Une sorcière comme les autres

Anne Sylvestre

French Music - Released May 10, 2004 | Epm

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L'amour hélas

Clio

Pop - Released April 23, 2021 | UGo&Play

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Offenbach : La Périchole (Live)

Marc Minkowski

Classical - Released June 14, 2019 | Bru Zane

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Recordings of Offenbach's 1868 operetta La Périchole, here performed in an 1873 revision, have been rather uncommon. True, it doesn't contain any of the big Offenbach hits, and its Peruvian setting, with a variety of Spanish dances and chinoiserie standing in for whatever music might have been heard in colonial Peru, seems increasingly preposterous as time goes on. However, verisimilitude has never been a requirement in operetta, and this story of the titular street singer (who was an actual historical individual) pursued by a sleazy colonial administrator hits a lot of the bases. Anglophone listeners will note that Arthur Sullivan surely knew this music inside and out, and replicated the combination of limpid songs for the heroine and quite a few sharp narrative choruses. This production, recorded live in 2018 at the Festival Radio France Occitanie in Montpellier, is nothing fancy, but that is its charm. La Périchole is nicely sung by a mezzo-soprano with the delightful name of Aude Extrémo, who resists the temptation to ham it up (sample her drunk scene, "Ah, quel diner je viens de faire") and inhabits the role well. The large cast is consistent, and conductor Marc Minkowski and Les Musiciens du Louvre, far from their Baroque origins, keep things moving in a lively way. One gets the sense that Offenbach would have been fully satisfied, and the recording is a must for any operetta fan.© TiVo
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BÜRRHUS Saison 2

Cabadzi

Hip-Hop/Rap - Released February 25, 2022 | Le Cirque Absent

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Je me souviens

Ménélik

Soul/Funk/R&B - Released June 13, 1997 | S.M.A.L.L.

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Résilience

Zaho

Hip-Hop/Rap - Released July 28, 2023 | Suther Kane

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J'aime ta grand-mère

Les Trois Accords

French Music - Released October 22, 2012 | La Tribu

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L'Horizon (Edition Spéciale)

Dominique A

French Music - Released February 27, 2006 | Wagram Music - Cinq 7

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Chansons pour Lula

Serge Rezvani

French Music - Released March 24, 2023 | Jacques Canetti Productions

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Trafic

Gaëtan Roussel

French Music - Released September 28, 2018 | Barclay

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Résilience

Zaho

Hip-Hop/Rap - Released January 20, 2023 | Suther Kane

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