VoxBox:The Songs of André Caplet

VoxBox: The Songs of André Caplet

Unlike most early twentieth century  French composers, Claude Debussy did not engage in any formal institutional teaching.  However, he did have one "disciple", André Caplet,  (1878-1925) a brilliant young French pianist, conductor and composer, who effectively became his assistant, almost his musical secretary, conducting many of the early performances of "Pelléas et Mélisande" including its first London performance. 

Though hugely influenced by his close association with Debussy, Caplet developed a highly individual style, writing songs of great intensity, more often of ecstasy than despair. This evening we bring you many of those songs written between 1902 and 1924. Some of the grandest were written while on active service in the trenches as a soldier in the French army during World War 1, including one which Pierre Bernac, the great French baritone for whom Poulenc wrote more than half of his songs, declared on one occasion to be in his opinion the finest song in the entire repertoire of piano-accompanied French song, and which will be among the songs you will hear.

After the war, his style evolved further, in one set of three songs espousing a technique akin to Schönbergian "Sprechstimme" but with a French accent, also to be included in our programme of about one hour's duration. However, his health had been seriously compromised by his wartime experiences, and he died at the age of 46 in 1925. We will end with one of his last and finest songs - heart-rending and yet serene - and which seems to me to sum up more eloquently than any other song known to me, what was lost in Western culture as a result of the catastrophe of World War 1. 

Running time approx. 60 minutes