Françaix: Quatuor a vents - flute, oboe, clarinet and bassoon

This disc commemorates the centenary of Jean Françaix, (1912-1997), and celebrates his music, written with the stated aim to ‘give pleasure’.

Françaix wrote his first chamber work for winds, the Quartet, in 1933 at the age of 21, and completed his Quintet No.2 more than 50 years later – with a remarkably consistent style marked by lightness and wit.

The highly regarded Bergen Woodwind Quintet, consisting of solo players from the Bergen Philharmonic Orchestra, here performs four chamber works for winds. The versatile ensemble released its first disc on BIS in 1985, and has recorded chamber music by Carl Nielsen as well as by David Maslanka, to critical acclaim.

This new Hybrid SACD recording features four members of the internationally renowned Afflatus (Wind) Quintet performing music by several French composers including Ibert, Bozza, Debussy, Gounod, Tomas, and Françaix. Afflatus Quartet derives from Afflatus (Wind) Quintet, the winner of one of the most prestigious chamber music competitions in the world, the International Music Competition of the ARD Munich 1997. With Radek Baborak, the world famous horn player and Afflatus member taking a "vacation" from the ensemble, the four remaining members, each of which is an active soloist throughout Europe and especially in Czech Republic, have produced an album of music by 20th century French composers. The disc includes Ibert’s ‘The Little White Donkey’, Deux Mouvements, and Cinq Pièces en Trio; Bozza’s Sonatine, and Trois Pièces pour une Musique de Nuit; Debussy’s ‘Golliwog’s Cakewalk’, and ‘The Little Shepherd’; Gounod’s ‘Funeral March of a Marionette, Tomasi’s Concert Champêtre; and Françaix’s Quartet for Wind Instruments.

The fourth volume in The Fibonacci Sequence’s acclaimed series of CD’s focussing on a solo instrument. In this case it’s the turn of the oboe, featuring Christopher O’Neal.

The Fibonacci Sequence is now well established as one of the finest chamber ensembles in Britain.

This witty collection of music for oboe and chamber ensemble, highlights, as oboist Christopher O’Neal describes “the humour of Françaix, the irony of Poulenc, the brilliance of Crusell and the easy charm of Alwyn.” But, he adds, “the two Mozart pieces have it all, and in spades!”