Edouard Lalo Symphonie espagnole & Concerto russe (Remastered) Gérard Poulet, Prague Radio Symphony Orchestra & Vladimir Valek

• Édouard Lalo (1823 - 1892): Symphonie espagnole, Op. 21:
• 1 Lalo: Symphonie espagnole, Op. 21: I. Allegro non troppo 08:04
• 2 Lalo: Symphonie espagnole, Op. 21: II. Scherzando. Allegro molto 04:15
• 3 Lalo: Symphonie espagnole, Op. 21: III. Intermezzo. Allegretto non troppo 06:12
• 4 Lalo: Symphonie espagnole, Op. 21: IV. Andante 06:49
• 5 Lalo: Symphonie espagnole, Op. 21: V. Rondo. Allegro 08:30
• Concerto russe, Op. 29:
• 6 Lalo: Concerto russe, Op. 29: I. Prélude (Allegro) 14:36
• 7 Lalo: Concerto russe, Op. 29: II. Lento (Chants russes) 05:02
• 8 Lalo: Concerto russe, Op. 29: III. Intermezzo (allegro non troppo) 04:36
• 9 Lalo: Concerto russe, Op. 29: IV. Introduction. Vivace (Chants russes) 08:29
• Total Runtime 01:06:33

Info for Edouard Lalo Symphonie espagnole & Concerto russe (Remastered)

Full justice may be done to Lalo s work on the occasion of his bi-centenary in 2023. Its eminently French style purity, its sharpness, clarity and beguiling colourfulness would ensure a triumph for dedicatee violinist Pablo de Sarasate and acclaim for the Spanish flavour of the Symphony, followed in the 20th century by Stern, Oistrakh and Perlman. Sarasate paid little heed to the Concerto s haunting Russianness whose exquisite splendour was only revealed in 1993 by Gérard Poulet in Prague.

Gérard Poulet, violin
Prague Radio Symphony Orchestra
Vladimir Valek, conductor

Digitally remastered

Gérard Poulet
Son of the renowned conductor and violinist Gaston Poulet, Gérard Poulet began learning the violin at five, entered the Paris Conservatoire at eleven under André Asselin and won the violin prize aged twelve. After a prodigious win at the Genoa Paganini Competition in 1956 he took further instruction from Francescatti, Menuhin, Milstein and Szeryng—an impressive pedagogic lineup from which he names Szeryng as his ‘musical father’. Like many who enjoyed the guidance of illustrious masters, Poulet followed suit, teaching at the Paris, Vienna and Beijing conservatories and Tokyo University.

Poulet’s playing is distinctive and in many ways impressive. His Corelli Trio Sonata (2007, with what sounds like a very large harpsichord!), though not entirely comfortable stylistically, is delivered with an energetic commitment sometimes lacking in so-called period performances. From more recent repertoire, the whimsical Méditation by Franco-Lebanese composer-poet Bechara El-Khoury (1988) proves to be a showcase for Poulet’s flexible cantabile tone—drifting effortlessly from honeyed sweetness to heartfelt profundity—and his instinctive sense of rhetoric in conveying the musical narrative. He excels further in Romantic music. Despite his admiration of Szeryng, Poulet’s playing does not have Szeryng’s tough-minded, rather distant modernism, but an extraordinary warmth and depth which, when combined with a wide vibrato and a refreshingly open attitude to portamento, makes him sound rather old-fashioned—enjoyably so, in fact.

His lively (2009) Mendelssohn F major Sonata has some very warm tones in the first two movements, and an exciting romp through the effervescent finale. Kreisler’s famous miniatures Liebeslied and Liebesfreud are delivered with élan and a depth of sound to rival the composer’s own (often missing from many readings of Kreisleriana by modern players). Janáček’s difficult and tortured Violin Sonata (2009) is given a bittersweet intensity, avoiding any temptation to sugarcoat an uncomfortable musical idiom.

Vieuxtemps’s Concerto No. 7 (1997) and Franck’s Sonata in A (2001) demonstrate a relaxed relationship with the music that comes only with a fully-assimilated sense of style, including quite a lot of portamento and a vibrato that, were it slightly narrower, would accord with the French sound of the early twentieth century. There is even some interesting piano arpeggiation from Bruno Rigutto, further suggesting an older mode of interpretation.

Booklet for Edouard Lalo Symphonie espagnole & Concerto russe (Remastered)