Bizet: L'Arlesienne Suite No. 1

These unique recordings make their first appearance on CD. Some make their first ever appearance on Decca! Jean Morel (1903–75) counted among his teachers Isidore Philipp, Gabriel Pierné and Reynaldo Hahn. He established a connection with the United States early on, teaching at the American Conservatory in Fontainebleu between 1921 (when he was just eighteen!) and 1936. his conducting pupils included James Levine and Leonard Slatkin. Morel’s conducting bore many similarities to that of his countryman Pierre Monteux. His style was bright, clear and energetic, and he always gave the music’s colour its due. Appearing here is the only recording in the Decca catalogue of the complete orchestral version of Albéniz’s Iberia – in orchestrations by Arbós and Surinach. Completing this Spanish-flavoured program is music by Chabrier, Bizet and Ravel. The legendary Decca engineer Kenneth Wilkinson is responsible for the great ‘Decca Sound’.

It is difficult to understand today the critical mauling meted out to Bizet’s operatic masterpiece Carmen after its Paris premier in 1875. Act 3 was greeted with total silence. The music and characters described as vulgar and not fit for the stage by critics. Later that year, the Viennese premier set Carmen on the path to success it deserved, but by then Bizet had died aged just 37, not knowing that the opera would become one of the world’s favourites. Carmen broke new operatic ground in that the characters are real, earthy, and flawed. The portrayal of Jose’s decline from honest peasant, to soldier, to a drunk deserter and smuggler is a masterpiece of theatre. Bizet’s score is crammed full of colourful tunes that have become firm favourites. The two suites on this CD were arranged by Ernest Guiraud, who produced the sung recitatives for the production in Vienna to replace the spoken dialogue of the original. Using the preludes and entr’actes Guiraud skilfully draws material from the opera not in sequence, but in a way that makes a satisfying orchestral condensation of what the opera is about.