Half an hour of the finest classical music

“We start with one György Ligeti's 'Bagatelle', transcribed for wind quintet from his 'Musica ricercata'. "I began to experiment with very simple structures of rhythms and sonorities", the composer explained, "as if to build up a ‘new music’ from nothing." Follows the 3rd movement of William Grant Still's Symphony No. 4 'Autochthonous', which the composer described as "humorous and unmistakably typical of our country and its rhythms". Then we hear a harpsichord concerto by Carlos Seixas, a 18th-century Portuguese composer who was organist at Coimbra Cathedral before being appointed at the court of King John V. Arvo Pärt's 'Estonian Lullaby', is adapted from a folk song from northeast Estonia. "Lullabies are like little pieces of lost Paradise," said the composer, "– a small consolation combined with the feeling of profundity and intimacy." After composing sacred music herself, Clémence de Grandval wrote operas and secular instrumental music; because of her social position, she had to publish her works under various pseudonyms, and had to fight against gender prejudice. Then we stay in France with Reynaldo Hahn's operetta 'Ciboulette', and 'Tableaux de Provence' by Paule Maurice. Luigi Boccherini's Cello Concerto No. 9 is next, before an anonymous 'Spanish Romance', made famous by René Clément's 1952 film 'Jeux interdits' ('Forbidden Games') which tells the story of two children during the Second World War. Then comes Jean Coulthard's 'Excursion', a piece for orchestra from the early forties and which contributed to the composer's musical reputation in Canada. We finish with 'La Lisonjera' by Cécile Chaminade who was a iconic pianist and prolific composer, and who Georges Bizet used to call a 'Little Mozart'... ________________ Producer: Julien Rosa”