Physical Release: 24 October 2025
Digital Release: 7 November 2025
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| Composer(s) | Émile Nerini, Claude Delvincourt, Francis Poulenc, Gustave Samazeuilh, Henri Dutilleux, Maurice Ravel, Olivier Messiaen |
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When one surveys twentieth – century flute repertoire the list seems endless; a selection was therefore unavoidable. I have chosen works that are central to the canon, personal favourites, and pieces that I judge particularly significant. In addition – and this has been one of my guiding aims since I began producing recordings – I am committed to reviving scores that enjoyed considerable success in their day yet, through chance or circumstance, have slipped from view.
For that reason this three – disc collection contains such undisputed masterpieces as the Sonatas of Poulenc, Prokofiev, Schulhoff, Martinů and Hindemith, together with the Paris Conservatoire test – pieces by Dutilleux, Messiaen and Martin; but it also offers rarities, such as the atmospheric Sonata by Émile Nerini, written for René Le Roy in 1923, and the intriguing, exotic Suite Au jardin des palmes composed for Marcel Moyse in 1946 by the Jewish composer André Bloch – works once celebrated, now largely forgotten.
Volume II – CONTEMPLATIONS
This second volume presents an all French programme that pays homage both to the great French flute tradition and to Paris itself. It includes pillars of the repertory – Francis Poulenc’s Sonata, Henri Dutilleux’s Sonatine and Olivier Messiaen’s Le Merle noir – alongside less familiar pieces: Messiaen’s Vocalise – étude, Ravel’s Vocalise – étude en forme de habanera, and two short works never before recorded, Gustave Samazeuilh’s Esquisse d’Espagne and Claude Delvincourt’s Contemplation, the latter providing the album’s title. The programme closes with Émile Nerini’s Sonata for flute and piano, previously preserved only in a live recording by the celebrated flautist Maxence Larrieu. Despite Larrieu’s advocacy, the piece has unjustly fallen into neglect, yet its musical and expressive worth merits revival. Composed between 1920 and 1922 for René Le Roy, it was first performed in Paris in 1923 by Le Roy with the composer at the piano, to considerable acclaim. Alternating C – sharp minor and major, the Sonata unfolds in three movements: a lyrical Calmo e poetico; an Allegretto scherzando – a kind of scherzo with a more cantabile intermezzo; and a concluding Con moto spirituoso in the manner of Gabriel Fauré, Nerini’s model. Besides the Sonata, Nerini left several other works for flute and piano: Pages d’Album Op. 6, a Notturno and a Saltarello Op. 25.
Francis Poulenc (1899–1963) composed his Sonata for flute and piano between Paris and Cannes in 1956–57, the very years in which he was working on his opera Dialogues des Carmélites; the connections between the two masterpieces are striking. The second movement, Cantilena, approaches the prayer of Sister Constance, while the slow section of the third movement corresponds to an orchestral intermezzo introduced by the cor anglais in the opera. The first movement, Allegro malinconico, is cast in three sections – A–B–A varied, concluding with a coda. The finale, Presto giocoso, bursts forth as a profane celebration in stark contrast to the second movement’s religiosity, epitomising Poulenc’s dual nature. Though dedicated to the memory of the patroness Elizabeth Sprague Coolidge, the Sonata is very much an homage to the great flautist Jean – Pierre Rampal, its principal interpreter, who premiered it with Poulenc at the piano in Strasbourg in 1957, in the presence of Arthur Rubinstein. As an imagined encore we include Poulenc’s celebrated song Les Chemins de l’amour (1940), a nostalgic waltz of the Belle Époque written in the grim days of war.
Henri Dutilleux’s (1916–2013) Sonatine, composed in 1943 as a Paris Conservatoire test – piece and dedicated to Gaston Crunelle, has, since its première by graduating students on 17 June 1943, remained firmly in every flautist’s concert repertoire. It is both a compendium of flute technique – especially in its cadenzas – and a model of twentieth – century chamber – music expressiveness, the piano part dovetailing perfectly with the flute. The commission came from the Conservatoire’s director, the composer Claude Delvincourt (1888–1954), whose own Contemplation for flute (or violin) and piano (1935) is recorded here. During the Occupation Delvincourt, aided by the organist Marie – Louise Boëllmann, sheltered his students from compulsory labour service by forming the Conservatoire Cadet Orchestra – an ingenious ruse that eventually forced him himself into hiding. In 1953 he introduced a compulsory general – culture course for all students, seeking to broaden their horizons. His Quatuor à cordes was his final work; en route to Rome for its première he died in a car accident near Orbetello. A former member of the Croix de Feu, Delvincourt had joined the Front National des Musiciens, a Resistance organisation.
A towering twentieth – century figure, Olivier Messiaen (1908–1992) is represented by a Vocalise – étude of 1935 and by Le Merle noir, another Conservatoire piece (1952). An avid ornithologist, Messiaen here bases an entire composition on birdsong for the first time, foreshadowing many later works. The overall form is A–A′–B: an opening flute cadenza (‘un peu vif, avec fantaisie’) leads to a dialogue (‘quasi lento, tendre’) that returns in varied form before a brilliant coda (‘vivace’) rounds off the piece. Written for Gaston Crunelle’s Paris class, it was later dedicated to the Italian virtuoso Severino Gazzelloni, whom Messiaen met at the Darmstadt courses.
Gustave Samazeuilh (1877–1967) is little known even to musicians. A pupil of Ernest Chausson and later of Vincent d’Indy and Charles Bordes at the Schola Cantorum, he also received guidance from Paul Dukas. Close to Enescu, Fauré, Ravel and Roussel, and a friend of Richard Strauss, he was best known as a critic, musicographer and translator, though he produced over a hundred piano reductions of contemporary works. He also produced a notable reduction for flute (or violin) and piano of Debussy’s Prélude à l’après-midi d’un faune, and was a member of the Collaboration group during the Occupation—a fact that casts a complex shadow over his otherwise distinguished career. His Esquisse d’Espagne for flute (or oboe) and piano, written in 1914, belongs to the vogue for musical exoticism; its Iberian colour reflects the dedicatee, Maurice Ravel (1875–1937). Ravel’s own Vocalise – étude en forme de habanera (1907) – the oldest piece in this set – overflows with the expressive nuance so characteristic of a composer deeply rooted in his Basque origins; born in Ciboure on the Franco – Spanish border, he imbued the piece with unmistakable Hispanic inflections. Originally for voice and piano, it exists in many arrangements, including the flute version made by Louis Fleury (1878–1926), one of the instrument’s principal teachers and performers, dedicatee of Debussy’s Syrinx and numerous other seminal flute works.
Filippo Mazzoli © 2025
DENIS ZARDI, pianist and composer. Pupil of M°M. Minguzzi for the piano, he graduated with full marks, honors and honorable mention, he subsequently perfected at the “Incontri col Maestro” piano academy of Imola with M° F. Scala. In 2003 he obtained the second level diploma at the European Conservatory of Rotterdam in the class of M° Aquiles delle Vigne, graduating with full marks. He studied composition with the masters C. A. Grandi and A. Guarnieri at the “G. B. Martini” conservatory of Bologna. He recently completed the two-year specialization in analytical composition with full marks, honors and special mention, under the guidance of M° P. Aralla. He teaches piano at the "Tomadini" Conservatoire in Udine.
Claude Delvincourt
(b Paris, 12 Jan 1888; d Orbetello, Tuscany, 5 April 1954). French administrator and composer. In addition to studying law, he was a pupil at the Paris Conservatoire of Leon Boëllmann, Büsser and Caussade, and later of Widor. He was sent as a recruit to the front at Argonne in 1914, working with a group of sound therapists. On 31 December 1915 he was severely wounded by shell shot, and his convalescence lasted until 1920. He was appointed director of the Versailles Conservatory in 1931, and in 1941, during the German occupation, he took over the direction of the Paris Conservatoire. He proved well-suited to this position, running the institution with great efficiency, and establishing a close rapport with his students. His most important decisions were the founding of the Orchestre des Cadets and of a chorus (so avoiding the evacuation of his pupils to Germany), and his invitation to Messiaen, despite much comment, to teach the philosophy of music, the origin of the analysis class that was to attract young composers from all over the world.
Delvincourt's music is marked by a Cartesian control which does not preclude the depth of feeling of his L'offrande à Çiva, the humour of his Croquembouches or the love of youth displayed in his Heures juvéniles. After Debussy and Ravel, he was one of the most ardent of French composers in trying to recapture the spirit of the Middle Ages and the Renaissance, as in the Danceries. He died in a car accident while on his way to Rome to hear the première of his String Quartet.
Francis Poulenc: (b Paris, 7 Jan 1899; d Paris, 30 Jan 1963). French composer and pianist. During the first half of his career the simplicity and directness of his writing led many critics away from thinking of him as a serious composer. Gradually, since World War II, it has become clear that the absence from his music of linguistic complexity in no way argues a corresponding absence of feeling or technique; and that while, in the field of French religious music, he disputes supremacy with Messiaen, in that of the mélodie he is the most distinguished composer since the death of Fauré.
Gustave Samazeuilh
(b Bordeaux, 2 June 1877; d Paris, 4 Aug 1967). French composer and critic. He knew Ravel from childhood and they remained friends until Ravel’s death (1937). Debussy, however, was a greater musical influence. They met in 1896 when Samazeuilh was 19. The following year he studied the Prélude à l’après-midi d’un faune with Debussy and became his propagandist. He attended the first 12 performances of Pélleas et Mélisande, and declared ‘I was, I am, a Debussyst, as I am a Wagnerian’. In Paris, he studied with d’Indy at the Schola Cantorum, then briefly with Chausson. Chausson introduced him, in 1897, to Dukas, whose disciple and friend Samazeuilh became. During his years of study, he made several visits to Germany (1894, 1897, 1898). It was at Bayreuth that he met Richard Strauss.
Henri Dutilleux
(b Angers, 22 Jan 1916). French composer. Dutilleux was born into an artistic family; a great-grandfather, Constant Dutilleux, was a painter and friend of Delacroix and Corot, and his maternal grandfather, Julien Koszul, was a composer, organist and lifelong friend of Fauré. Koszul was director of the Roubaix Conservatoire, where his pupils included Roussel, whom he persuaded to leave the navy and devote himself to music. Dutilleux was brought up in Douai, studying harmony, counterpoint and piano with Victor Gallois at the local conservatory until 1933, when he moved to Paris. Gallois also encouraged Dutilleux to play percussion in the local orchestra, an interest which later bore fruit in the elaborate timpani parts of many of his orchestral works. At the Paris Conservatoire, he studied harmony with Jean Gallon, fugue with Noël Gallon, history of music with Maurice Emmanuel, conducting with Gaubert and composition with Büsser; he won the Prix de Rome at his third attempt in 1938 with the cantata L'anneau du roi. He was aware of the limitations of his Conservatoire education, which did not feature much contemporary music and lacked an analysis class. To fill the gaps in his education, he studied d'Indy's composition treatise on his own during the war years (d'Indy's analytical approach to early music interested him), and discovered works by Stravinsky and Roussel. He did not become familiar with the music of the Second Viennese School or Bartók's later works until the postwar period. Dutilleux spent only four months in Rome as a Prix de Rome winner, returning to France before the outbreak of World War II. He was enlisted as a stretcher-bearer in September 1939. Demobilized in August 1940, he worked as chef de chant at the Paris Opéra for a few months (replacing the permanent member of staff) under the Occupation. From 1945 he was director of music productions at French radio, resigning from this post in 1963 to devote himself to composition. Dutilleux has had few formal teaching posts; he was professor of composition at the Ecole Normale de Musique (1961–70), and taught at the Paris Conservatoire (1970), but he has frequently attended summer schools (including Tanglewood) as a guest teacher
Maurice Ravel (b Ciboure, Basses-Pyrénées, 7 March 1875; d Paris, 28 Dec 1937). French composer. He was one of the most original and sophisticated musicians of the early 20th century. His instrumental writing – whether for solo piano, for ensemble or for orchestra – explored new possibilities, which he developed at the same time as (or even before) his great contemporary Debussy, and his fascination with the past and with the exotic resulted in music of a distinctively French sensibility and refinement.
Olivier Messiaen: (b Avignon, 10 Dec 1908; d Paris, 28 April 1992). French composer, organist and teacher. He was a musician apart. The sources of his music may be traced on the one hand to the French organ tradition and on the other to the innovations of Debussy, Stravinsky and Bartók, but right at the start of his career he found a modal system that has a completely individual sound, and to this he remained true, even when he vastly extended the possibilities of his style after World War II. He was alone, too, among major 20th-century composers in his joyously held Catholic faith, which again was unswerving, however much he came to value non-European cultures, especially Indian and Japanese. As a teacher he instructed many of the most prominent composers of the next two generations.
13.76€
