ルイ・ベイツ歌曲集

こんな魅力的なフランス歌曲が隠されていた!
シリル・デュボワ渾身のベイツ作品集

個性的な高音で飛ぶ鳥落とす勢いのテノール歌手シリル・デュボワ。バロックから20世紀まで幅広いレパートリーを誇る彼が、20世紀前半にフランスで活躍した作曲家ルイ・ベイツの歌曲に挑戦。大半が世界初録音なのも大歓迎です。

ルイ・ベイツ(1895-1953)はボルドー出身の作曲家。パリでメサジェとレイナルド・アーンに師事し、フランスのオペレッタ最後の大作曲家となりました。ジャズやシャンソンの影響も取り込みつつ、オシャレで華やかな世界を作りました。これまで録音されなかったのが不思議なほど魅力的なものばかり。フランス音楽ファンは見逃せないアルバムです。
キングインターナショナル

The aged Faure and Reynaldo Hahn took the French Romantic melodie into the 20th century, and Louis Beydts, who studied with Hahn, took it even further; three of the song cycles here date from after World War II. Beydts was mostly known as a composer of film music, and the songs on this release by tenor Cyrille Dubois and pianist Tristan Raes are all but unknown; three of the cycles receive their world premieres here. The music may seem to evoke a vanished world, but it is often engaging. Beydts distills the Faure style down to essences, and most of the songs are quite short. The texts are by a variety of French poets of the day, and physical album buyers will get good translations in the hefty booklet. The Cinq Humoresques are sharp little character studies, and in many of the songs, there is a measure of wit (sample "Mademoiselle Rose"). The songs often take the conversational tone of Faures songs and dial it down several notches. Dubois has a nicely controlled tone in very quiet material (which describes many of the songs), letting the vibrato drain from his voice but not going flat. Hear "Adonis" for a good example of his comfort with the musical language. The Chansons pour les oiseaux are delightful and could easily be programmed with other works about animals. These are subtle little pieces, but they are immensely appealing, and it is no surprise that the album made classical best-seller charts in the spring of 2024. ~ James Manheim