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World music CD DVD shop and Classic distribution
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ID: OA0817D
CDs: 1
Type: DVD
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Collection: Documentary
Actors: Judith Howarth, Christopher Robinson, BBC Philharmonic
Format: Anamorphic, Classical, Colour, DVD-Video, Widescreen, PAL
Language: French
Subtitles: German, English, French, Spanish
Region: All Regions
Aspect Ratio: 16:9 - 1.78:1
Number of discs: 1
Classification: Exempt
Studio: Opus Arte
DVD Release Date: 27 Mar 2002
Run Time: 78 minutes
Francis Poulenc was a tantalising character, part-monk and part-rascal according to the critic Claude Rostand. As in Stabat mater his music reflects this Janus-like persona, tears never far beneath the surface of even his most jovial offerings. Early on he had renounced the devout Catholicism of his family but rediscovered his faith after the premature death of a close friend, the composer and patron Pierre-Octave Ferroud. It was this event that prompted Poulenc's pilgrimage to the Black Madonna of Rocamadour, who nestles benevolently, high up in the rock face.
An important body of sacred works ensued, not least his Stabat mater, a personal memorial to Ferroud. This is performed here by the combined Cambridge choirs of St John's, Clare and Gonville, and Caius; they're pleasingly mellifluous and disciplined but sound utterly un-French. The work can take it, but this is not the most tender performance. The strange and haunting Motets (Claire and Gonville and Caius Choirs) are dramatically the high point of this concert, while the otherworldly beauty of the ethereal (female-voice) Litanies tugs at the heart-strings. As a visual experience, we get two different locations but there's not a great deal you can do with a bunch of singers. The best things are the close-ups of a fabulous Chagall window (which comes from another church entirely, but who cares?). |
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