Francis Poulenc
Francis Poulenc was the leading composer of Les Six, the French group devoted to turning music away from Impressionism, formality, and intellectualism. He wrote in a direct and tuneful manner, often juxtaposing the witty and ironic with the sentimental or melancholy. He heavily favored diatonic and modal textures over chromatic writing. His music also shows many elements of pandiatonicism, introduced around 1920 by Stravinsky, whose influence can be heard in some of Poulenc's compositions, such as the religious choral work Gloria. Poulenc is regarded as one of the most important 20th century composers of religious music, and in the realm of the French art song, he is also a major voice of his time. Poulenc was also a pianist of considerable ability.
Poulenc was born in Paris on January 7, 1899, into a wealthy family of pharmaceutical magnates. The agrochemical giant Rhone-Poulenc is the present-day corporation started by his forebears. His mother was a talented amateur pianist who began giving him piano lessons at age five. Later, Poulenc studied with a niece of César Franck and then with the eminent Spanish virtuoso Ricardo Viñes, for whom he would later write music. At age eighteen, Poulenc wrote Rapsodie Nègre for baritone and chamber ensemble, which made him an overnight sensation in France. The young composer served in the military during the years 1918 to 1921, during which time he composed the popular Trois Mouvements Perpétuels (1918).
By 1920, Les Six -- Georges Auric, Arthur Honegger, Darius Milhaud, Germaine Tailleferre (the sextet's lone female representative), Louis Durey, and Francis Poulenc -- had begun making its impression on the music world. In 1923, Poulenc wrote the ballet Les Biches, which Diaghilev staged the following year with great success, the public finding its mixture of lightness, gaiety, and occasional moments of sentimentality irresistible. Poulenc continued writing at a fairly prolific pace in the late '20s and early '30s, producing many piano compositions, songs, and other works. In 1935, he rekindled his friendship with baritone Pierre Bernac, thus launching a productive and enduring professional relationship. He also returned to the Roman Catholic Church that year when close friend Pierre-Octave Ferroud was killed in an automobile accident. Thereafter, he wrote many important works of a religious nature, the first of which were Litanies à la Vierge Noire, for soloists, chorus, and organ, and Mass in G for mixed a cappella chorus, both from 1936.
During World War II, Poulenc remained in German-occupied France, writing music of an antiwar or defiantly anti-Nazi bent, sometimes writing songs on texts by banned authors, such as Lorca. He also wrote a ballet, Les Animaux Modèles (1940-1941), Sonata for violin and piano (1942-1943; rev. 1949) dedicated to Lorca, and the masterful Figure Humaine (1943), a choral cantata which is a hymn to freedom. In the postwar years, Poulenc turned out his Sinfonietta (1947) and Piano Concerto (1949), both not entirely successful. In the period from 1953 to 1956, Poulenc produced his most ambitious work, the opera Dialogue des Carmelites, considered by many the greatest French opera of the 20th century.
Poulenc finished his last opera in 1958, La Voix Humaine, a work whose lone character talks (sings) on the phone to her deserting lover for the work's 45-minute length. Notable also in this period is his Gloria (1959), a work shorn of sanctimony and rich in communicative simplicity and fervent religiosity. Poulenc's last major work was his Sonata for Oboe and Piano in 1962, dedicated to the memory of Prokofiev, whom he had befriended in the 1920s. Poulenc died suddenly of a heart attack on January 30, 1963.
© Robert Cummings /TiVo
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Poulenc: Choix de mélodies (Mono Version)
Pierre Bernac, Francis Poulenc
Divers - Released by BNF Collection on 1 jan. 1958
24-Bit 96.0 kHz - Stereo -
Poulenc: Le bal masqué (Mono Version)
Pierre Bernac, Orchestre du Theatre National De L'Opera De Paris, Francis Poulenc
Divers - Released by BNF Collection on 1 jan. 1957
24-Bit 96.0 kHz - Stereo -
Satie: La belle excentrique & En habit de cheval (Mono Version)
Francis Poulenc, Jacques Février
Kamermuziek - Released by BNF Collection on 1 jan. 1962
24-Bit 96.0 kHz - Stereo -
Satie: Pièces pour piano (Mono Version)
Divers - Released by BNF Collection on 1 jan. 1957
24-Bit 96.0 kHz - Stereo -
Epigraphes
Rosanna Ter-Berg, Leo Nicholson
Kamermuziek - Released by West Wood Classical on 30 mrt. 2015
16-Bit CD Quality 44.1 kHz - Stereo -
Flute Sonata, FP164: II. Cantilena
Mark Bebbington, Emer McDonough
Klassiek - Released by Resonus Classics on 16 apr. 2021
24-Bit 96.0 kHz - Stereo -
Sextet, FP100: III. Finale
Klassiek - Released by Resonus Classics on 23 apr. 2021
24-Bit 96.0 kHz - Stereo -
Choix de mélodies (Mono Version)
Pierre Bernac, Francis Poulenc
Divers - Released by BNF Collection on 1 jan. 1958
24-Bit 96.0 kHz - Stereo -
Poulenc, Debussy & Roussel: Récital de mélodies (Mono Version)
Genevieve Touraine, Francis Poulenc
Klassiek - Released by BNF Collection on 1 jan. 1955
24-Bit 96.0 kHz - Stereo -
Satie - Poulenc - Kosma - Wiéner: La chanson, l'amour, l'absurde
Vocale muziek (wereldlijk en religieus) - Released by VDE-GALLO on 13 nov. 2014
16-Bit CD Quality 44.1 kHz - Stereo -
Lumières sur Francis Poulenc, Vol. 2
Pop - Released by Weishaupt Music & Entertainment on 15 jul. 2017
16-Bit CD Quality 44.1 kHz - Stereo -
Francis Poulenc: Concerto En Ré Mineur Pour Deux Pianos Et Orchestre - Concert Champêtre Pour Clavecin Et Orchestre (125th Birthday - Album of 1962)
Francis Poulenc, Jacques Février, Aimée van de Wiele, Orchestre de la Société des Concerts du Conservatoire, Georges Prêtre
Klassiek - Released by FireBird on 30 nov. 2023
16-Bit CD Quality 44.1 kHz - Stereo -
Works for Two Pianos
Pierre van der Westhuizen, Sophie Grobler, Westhuizen Duo
Klassiek - Released by AMP Recordings on 27 apr. 2010
16-Bit CD Quality 44.1 kHz - Stereo -
Cocardes, FP 16b: II. Bonne d’Enfant
John Andrews, Manchester Camerata
Klassiek - Released by Resonus Classics on 12 apr. 2024
24-Bit 192.0 kHz - Stereo -
Dalasinfoniettan & Daniel Blendulf
Dalasinfoniettan, Francis Poulenc, Mats Larsson Gothe, György Ligeti, Daniel Blendulf
Symfonische muziek - Released by Swedish Society on 23 aug. 2019
16-Bit CD Quality 44.1 kHz - Stereo -
Erik Satie: Pièces Pour Le Piano
Klassiek - Released by Vinyle Numérique on 30 jun. 2023
24-Bit 44.1 kHz - Stereo -
Le Bal masqué, FP60: III. Malvina
Roderick Williams, Mark Bebbington
Klassiek - Released by Resonus Classics on 9 apr. 2021
24-Bit 96.0 kHz - Stereo -
Poulenc: Il ème Intermezzo en ré Bémol Majeur
Francis Poulenc, Pontus Carron
Klassiek - Released by EUROPEAN GRAMOPHONE on 11 apr. 2023
24-Bit 48.0 kHz - Stereo -
Aubade
Gabriel Fauré, Francis Poulenc, Vasteras Sinfonietta, Howard Shelley
Klassiek - Released by dB Productions on 16 sep. 2016
16-Bit CD Quality 44.1 kHz - Stereo -
Francis Poulenc: Sextet for Piano and Winds, Three Songs, Sonata for Two Pianos
Francis Poulenc, Jennie Tourel, Leonard Bernstein
Klassiek - Released by Soundmark on 30 jun. 2011
16-Bit CD Quality 44.1 kHz - Stereo -
Francis Poulenc ou L'Invité de Touraine (1899-1963)
Francis Poulenc, Claude Rostand
Educational - Released by Grandes Heures Radio France - Ina on 15 nov. 1995
16-Bit CD Quality 44.1 kHz - Stereo