Saint-Saëns: Romance, Op. 67

This selection of French music for horn and piano reveals the increasing variety in sound which the horn was able to produce thanks to the invention of valves.

The history of the horn and its technical development has been of particular importance to French music. In contrast to Germany, horn players in France initially declined to use the valved horn after its invention in the 19th-century, which was reflected in the style of contemporary composition.

Juxtaposing works for horn and piano of the 19th and 20th centuries allows an insight into the different playing techniques of the instrument and its development from natural to valved horn, the turning point of which is exemplified by Paul Dukas’ Villanelle.

The two Italian musicians Guglielmo Pellarin (horn) and Federico Lovato (piano) are making their joint recording début with this disc and have also chosen rarely heard works by the contemporary French composers Jean-Michel Damase and Jean-Michel Defaye, featuring surprisingly jazzy elements. The Sonata for Horn and Piano by Jean-Michel Damase is a première recording. Guglielmo Pellarin is principal horn of the Orchestra dell’Accademia Nazionale di Santa Cecilia in Rome. He also regularly performs with the Symphonica Toscanini, the orchestras of the Teatro Verdi di Trieste and the Teatro alla Scala di Milano and the Filarmonica della Scala under conductors including Lorin Maazel, Zubin Mehta and John Eliot Gardiner. He has won many prizes and has toured Italy, Austria, Slovenia and Canada.

Federico Lovato studied piano in Venice and Imola. He has won numerous national and international competitions. He has given solo and chamber performances throughout Italy and Europe, including at the Gasteig in Munich, Teatr Mały in Warsaw, Teatro alle Erbe in Milan and Sala Mozart in Bologna. His repertoire spans from classicism to contemporary music. In addition to his career as concert pianist he teaches and is the Artistic Director of the orchestra I Solisti in Villa.

Celebrated as one of the most successful and gifted composers of his day, Saint-Saëns wrote music for woodwind instruments throughout his long career. This recording presents music from his early days as the ‘bright young thing’ on the Parisian music scene to the last year of his life.

Canada’s renowned National Arts Centre Wind Quintet joins Stéphane Lemelin, a laureate of the Robert Casadesus International Competition, to interpret these assured and beautiful works which combine virtuosity, gentle wit and thoroughly French charm.

In a century mostly inspired by German romantic orchestral pieces, Saint-Saëns considered wind instruments as on the same level as violin and piano. He is the origin of the French Wind tradition and in the evening of his life, aged 85, came back to composing sonatas turning to wind instruments with enthusiasm.