Desormiere,Roger Roger Desormiere: The Decca Recordings CD

A landmark tribute to Roger Desormiere, a great French conductor of the mid-twentieth century, including many recordings new to CD. A car crash in March 1953 cruelly cut short the career of Roger Desormiere, who at the age of 53 had already established a reputation as one of the most insightful French conductors of his or any previous era. The resulting stroke left him barely able to communicate, incapable of work. His pupils, including Pierre Boulez, were distraught, but Desormiere clung on for thirteen painful years, eventually dying a broken man. Desormiere's legacy on disc is a case of what might have been. Record companies showed little interest in recording the modern repertoire of which he was so stylish and dedicated an interpreter, at least the equal in this regard of Hans Rosbaud and Rene Leibowitz. His one indisputable classic of the gramophone is the 1941 HMV recording of Pelleas et Melisande, but he recorded much else for several different labels. The present set brings together all his Decca recordings for the first time, made in mono between 1947 and 1951, newly remastered and constituting a substantial tribute to a musician of manifold gifts. As a regular conductor of both the Ballets Suedois and the Ballets Russes in Paris, Desormiere gave the premieres of Satie's last two ballets; Decca captured his mastery of ballet conducting in suites of Scarlatti, Chopin, Delibes and Tchaikovsky. Of music from his own time there is Poulenc's Les Biches, and the Divertissement of Ibert from 1951 (his final Decca recording), both done with the most refined ear for orchestral texture. His disc of lyric and coloratura arias with Janine Micheau unites him with a singer who, like him, brought a light touch to everything she did. On a visit to London in May 1947 Desormiere undertook his only recording assignment for Decca in the UK, recording in a single day Bizet's Jeux d'enfants and Patrie Overture, Debussy's Marche ecossaise and Chabrier's Habanera, in Kingsway Hall, with Sidney Beer's body of freelance players, the National Symphony Orchestra. Every other recording was made with the Paris Conservatoire Orchestra, and each one has a character as Parisian as the Tuileries and the Bateaux-mouches.

1. Bizet Patrie - Overture 2. Bizet Jeux D'enfants - Petite Suite 3. Bizet Jeux D'enfants - Petite Suite 4. Bizet Jeux D'enfants - Petite Suite 5. Bizet Jeux D'enfants - Petite Suite 6. Bizet Jeux D'enfants - Petite Suite 7. Chabrier Habanera 8. Debussy Marche Ecossaise 9. Scarlatti-Tommasini the Good-Humoured Ladies 10. Scarlatti-Tommasini the Good-Humoured Ladies 11. Scarlatti-Tommasini the Good-Humoured Ladies 12. Scarlatti-Tommasini the Good-Humoured Ladies 13. Scarlatti-Tommasini the Good-Humoured Ladies 14. Tchaikovsky the Sleeping Beauty - Suite, Op. 66A 15. Tchaikovsky the Sleeping Beauty - Suite, Op. 66A 16. Tchaikovsky the Sleeping Beauty - Suite, Op. 66A 17. Tchaikovsky the Sleeping Beauty - Suite, Op. 66A 18. Tchaikovsky the Sleeping Beauty - Suite, Op. 66A 19. Ippolitov-Ivanov Causasian Sketches - Suite No. 1 20. Ippolitov-Ivanov Causasian Sketches - Suite No. 1 21. Ippolitov-Ivanov Causasian Sketches - Suite No. 1 22. Ippolitov-Ivanov Causasian Sketches - Suite No. 1 23. Ibert Divertissement 24. Ibert Divertissement 25. Ibert Divertissement 26. Ibert Divertissement 27. Ibert Divertissement 28. Ibert Divertissement 29. Poulenc Les Biches - Suite 30. Poulenc Les Biches - Suite 31. Poulenc Les Biches - Suite 32. Poulenc Les Biches - Suite 33. Poulenc Les Biches - Suite 34. Poulenc Les Biches - Suite 35. Chopin-Douglas Les Sylphides 36. Chopin-Douglas Les Sylphides 37. Chopin-Douglas Les Sylphides 38. Chopin-Douglas Les Sylphides 39. Chopin-Douglas Les Sylphides 40. Chopin-Douglas Les Sylphides 41. Chopin-Douglas Les Sylphides 42. Delibes Copp?lia - Suite 43. Delibes Copp?lia - Suite 44. Delibes Copp?lia - Suite 45. Delibes Copp?lia - Suite 46. Delibes Copp?lia - Suite 47. Delibes Sylvia - Suite 48. Delibes Sylvia - Suite 49. Delibes Sylvia - Suite 50. Delibes Sylvia - Suite 51. Delibes Sylvia - Suite 52. Delibes Sylvia - Suite 53. Gounod Ah ! Je Veux Vivre (Rom?o Et Juliette) 54. Offenbach Les Oiseaux Dans la Charmille (Les Contes D'hoffmann) 55. Gounod O L?g?re Hirondelle (Mireille) 56. Thomas Je Suis Titania (Mignon) 57. Proch Deh! Torna Mi Bene (Air and Variations) 58. Charpentier Depuis Le Jour (Louise)