Ravel, Canteloube, Mussorgsky: Orchestre de Paris/Hengelbrock ***
Philharmonie de Paris, 18th May 2017
How fluent is your Occitan? Joseph Canteloube’s Chants d’Auvergne, his arrangement of folksongs from central France, are in the local language, not dissimilar to Catalan. They mostly concern the love lives of shepherds and shepherdesses, of which the most famous is the dreamy Baïlèro. Others are far less familiar. Great singers communicate meaning and sell a song whatever the language and Kate Lindsey does this superbly. Even without recourse to song texts and translations, it was perfectly clear what was happening in each of the seven selected for this performance with the Orchestre de Paris under Thomas Hengelbrock.
Kate Lindsey
© Rosetta Greek
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