Massenet: Elégie

Philippe Jaroussky, described by Germany’s Die Zeit as “the Apollo of countertenors’, stands out among his many talented contemporaries as much for the soprano-like beauty of his tone as for the elegance and insight of his interpretations and his adventurous and erudite approach to repertoire – whether unearthing neglected scores by little-known composers or venturing beyond the Baroque into the 19th and 20th centuries.

Established as one of Virgin Classics’ bestselling artists, Jaroussky, now aged 34, has been honoured three times in the Victoires de la Musique awards in his native France and has also received Germany’s most prominent music prize, the Echo Klassik. His diverse achievements are saluted in two new collections on Virgin Classics – the 2CD set “The Voice” and the DVD and Blu Ray “La Voix des rêves: Greatest moments in Concert”.

“LA VOIX DES RÊVES - Greatest Moments in Concert” (available on DVD & Blu Ray) features video footage from a number of occasions and venues – including items from a concert given among the crystal chandeliers of the splendid Galerie des Glaces in the palace of Versailles, and works by Handel and Vivaldi performed in another jewel of French Baroque architecture, the sumptuously decorated Chapelle de la Trinité in Lyon. Also included are exclusive interviews an array of fellow musicians: Jean-Christophe Spinosi, Emmanuelle Haïm, Christina Pluhar; Jérôme Ducros, Quatuor Ebène, Gautier Capuçon, Marie-Nicole Lemieux and Renaud Capuçon.

Jaroussky and his appeal were aptly summarised in a recent profile in the French magazine Balthazar: “Philippe Jaroussky alternates between opera and recitals, bringing his sensual, graceful voice and matinee idol looks, and this has made him a key star of classical music. But his recordings also reveal a skilled musicologist who has revived numerous forgotten artists like the castrato Carestini [and the composers] Johann Christian Bach and Caldara. Jaroussky simply glows. Anyone who has had the opportunity to meet him will find it hard to forget his enthusiastic conversation and his magnetic gaze.”

The singer made his passions clear in an interview with Crescendo magazine, revealing that “I don’t like being told I have the ‘voice of an angel’, because that would just mean that it sounds pretty and takes people out of themselves … I want to be able to evoke more human emotions too: sorrow, despair, jealousy.” Speaking to the leading French newspaper Le Monde, he went into more detail on his philosophy as a maturing singer: “Ten years into your career, you reach a certain level of purity in your approach. You are always set on improving – strengthening your high notes, your low notes, your projection or your expressivity – but you also accept what it means to be an artist.”

Although no longer a regular guest, José Carreras was in the 1970s and ’80s one of the great, up-and-coming singers and he returns in 2012 once more for a song recital in Salzburg on August 30. Accompanied here by Edoardo Müller, his recital of 1981 takes us from the French song with piano by Massenet and Fauré via the tenor “classics” of Tosti to the canciones of De Falla, Mompou and Turina – and all sung with a secure sense of style and with great subtlety.

Carreras’s encores delighted adherents of the brilliant tenor repertoire, and can be appreciated on this recording too.

Unsurprisingly, it is in the music of the Baroque era – the heyday of the castrato – that French countertenor Philippe Jaroussky has captured the attention of music-lovers lovers around the world. The ethereal, but sensuous beauty of his voice, his virtuosity and his sense of style have brought him critical praise, a number of major awards – including, in 2008, Germany’s prestigious Echo-Klassik prize for Male Singer of the Year, honouring his Virgin Classics album, Carestini: The Story of a Castrato – and impressive sales: more than 120,000 copies of his Vivaldi album Heroes and 90,000 of the Carestini release.

Jaroussky enters new territory with this programme of French songs from the late 19th and early 20th centuries – well over a hundred years after the end of the Baroque era. Taking its name, Opium, from a song by Saint-Saëns, it evokes the voluptuous, sometimes decadent spirit of the Belle Époque, the era of transition between Romanticism and Modernism. The programme includes a number of rarities by composers such as Dukas, Caplet, and Chaminade, as well as better-known numbers by figures like Fauré, Chausson and Hahn.

“Many people will probably wonder why a counter tenor should sing these songs,” says Jaroussky, “but if you think about it, the countertenor voice as such has no repertoire of its own, except the modern music written specifically for it. For the most part we sing music written for castratos who – as we know – had very different voices from ours. So why not venture into other musical worlds if we feel they are suited to our voices? … There has been David Daniels in Schubert, Max Emmanuel Cencic in Rossini, and even Andreas Scholl and Gérard Lesne in pop music.

“I’ve always felt a special affinity for French song, which was an area of focus in the early days of my studies with my teacher, Nicole Fallien. It was Renaud Capuçon -- whom I want to thank, along with Gautier Capuçon and Emmanuel Pahud for his valuable contribution to this disc -- who first had the idea of inviting me to sing Hahn, Chausson, Fauré in a recital. It was then that I met the pianist Jérôme Ducros, and we decided to work further on this rich and well-stocked repertoire, which contains some real undiscovered treasures. There is no theme to this album, but I wanted to record songs which have captured my heart and which suit my voice. Perhaps I can show them in a new light too.”

French song demands an acute sense of language and style, and today there are relatively few singers --- even native Francophones – who succeed in capturing its elusive magic. “I’ve decided to pronounce the texts in a way that is as close as possible to the spoken word – I don’t roll the ‘r’, for example,” continues Jaroussky. “The poetry should come to life without the imposition of too much interpretation or emotional contrivance. I’ve tried to approach it with humility.”

"Philippe Jaroussky is one of the best countertenors around. His voice is mellow, evenly toned, wide-ranging and largely free from intrusive mannerism and vocal strain” BBC Music Magazine, February 2007

‘The public feels so close and intimate. There’s really nowhere to escape…’ Angela Gheorghiu

2012 is the centenary of Jules Massenet’s death. Several of his operas have received important revivals this year

Unlike most other Massenet albums released this year this 2CD set celebrates equally his orchestral music (now becoming familiar once again in the concert hall after several years of neglect) and his operas.

Although the performances were recorded in the mono era, the majority of vocal extracts stem from a golden period of French music-making (1910s-1930s) and the orchestral recordings have been rated by critics as sonically ahead of their time.

Singers include Edmond Clément, Ninon Vallin, Georges Thill, Emma Luart, Bidu Sayão, Marcel Journet, Fanny Heldy and Cesare Valletti in roles they made famous. Jean Fournet, Albert Wolff, Robert Irving and Sir Thomas Beecham conduct the works for orchestra.

Jules Émile Frédéric Massenet (1842-1912) is best known for his operas Manon written in 1884, Werther in 1892, and Thaïs in 1894 and have remained firm favorites in the opera repertoire. In addition to his operas, Massenet composed concert suites, ballet music, oratorios, cantatas and over two hundred and eighty songs. There is only one cycle on this disc, the short Quelques Chansons Mauves, most of the other songs being individual compositions. Long term Massenet champion Richard Bonynge revived Massenet's opera Esclarmonde in 1974 in San Franciso, in 1976 at the Metropolitan Opera in New York and in 1983 at the Royal Opera House in London with, on all occasions, his wife Dame Joan Sutherland in the title role. Also on Guild Music is a CD of songs by Michael Balfe to be followed shortly by songs by William Vincent Wallace with the same artists.

Gabriel Bacquier has already, in his lifetime, entered the hallowed halls of great French singers. An incomparable actor, endowed with exceptional vocal means and an unbelievably rich timbre, he carried the art of interpretation to the highest level. For the first time on CD, Decca have issued a collection highlighting this baritone’s remarkable career.