Poulenc: Complete Music for Wind Instruments and Piano - Chamber Music Society of Lincoln Center, Charles Wadsworth

 

Sextet for Wind Quintet and Piano, FP 100 (1932-1939)
I. Allegro vivace 07:42
II. Divertissement Andantino 04:29
III. Finale: Prestissimo 05:46

Leonard Arner, Oboe
Robert Routch, Horn
Gervase de Peyer, Clarinet
Loren Glickman, Bassoon
Paula Robison, Flute
Charles Wadsworth, Piano

Sonata For Two Clarinets, FP 7 (1918, rev. 1945)
I. Presto: Tres rythme 01:35
II. Andante: Tres lent 02:29
III. Vif: Vite avec joie 01:48

Gervase de Peyer, Peter Simenauer, Clarinets


Sonata For Clarinet and Piano, FP 184 (1962)
1. Allegro tristamente 04:42
2. Romanza - Tres calme 04:46
3. Allegro con fuoco 03:02

Gervase de Peyer, Clarinet
Charles Wadsworth, Piano


Sonata for Clarinet and Bassoon, FP 32a (1922)
1. Allegro - Tres rythme 01:41
2. Romance - Andante tres doux 03:00
3. Finale - Tres anime 02:46

Gervase de Peyer, Clarinet
Loren Glickman, Bassoon


13 Villanelle, FP 74 (1934) 01:39

Paula Robison, Piccolo
Charles Wadsworth, Piano


Trio for Oboe, Bassoon and Piano, FP 43 (1926)
1. Presto 05:36
2. Andante con moto 04:11
3. Rondo: Tres vif 02:59

Leonard Amer, Oboe
Loren Glickman, Bassoon
Charles Wadsworth, Piano


Sonata for Flute and Piano, FP 164 (1956)
1. Allegro malinconico 04:36
2. Cantilena - Assez lent 04:14
3. Presto giocoso 03:37

Paula Robison, Flute
Charles Wadsworth, Piano


Elegie for Horn and Piano, FP 168 (1957)10:18

Robert Routch, Horn
Charles Wadsworth, Piano


Sonata for Oboe and Piano, FP 185 (1962)
1. Elegie - Paisiblement05:23
2. Scherzo - Tres anime04:05
3. Deploration - Tres calme04:39

Leonard Arner, Oboe
Charles Wadsworth, Piano

 

With their deaths comes an altering of traditions on how music should or should not be composed and performed; prejudices and persuasions waver, become secondhand, third hand, and Poulenc settles into new perspective. Hearing the woodwind catalog in one fell swoop forces me to realize that though each piece is foolproof, they're all the same. The sameness is stressed not because the language is ever unchanged (which it is, and so it was too with Chopin), but because there are no conversations, no argument, no strain. All players are in accord at all times. The two clarinets, the piano and oboe, the bassoon and horn, do not have separate personalities, they are clones nodding at each other. Is the sameness perhaps less trying in the vocal music where the tunes are quite simply more solid and contagious? Still, he never changed his tune throughout his life. During the final years Poulenc often said that he wished he were 20 again so as to take Boulez on his own terms. But if Poulenc's serial forays -- C Major pointillisms, he called them -- were more laughable than, say, Stravinsky's, it could be argued that Webern was there for the asking for both men, long before Boulez was born. I truly do feel that with passing time, just as various creators of other centuries now appear homogenized to us as they did not to themselves, so Webern and Poulenc like distant stars will eventually merge. But the brightness will come from Poulenc. -From notes by Ned Rorem