Strauss / Norwegian Chamber Orchestra Bourgeois Gentilhomme / Der Burger Als Edelmann CD

This new release is a unique coupling of two orchestral works on the same subject (Moliere's Le Bourgeois Gentilhomme), composed 240 years apart. It is incredibly interesting to check how a modern instrument orchestra adapts to play music of seventeenth and then twentieth centuries. Virtuosic playing and musicological approach go hand in hand in this recording. First performed in 1670 at the Chateau de Chambord in the Loire Valley, Moliere and Lully's Le bourgeois gentilhomme is a stage piece that combines spoken or sung comedy with dance. The work was a precursor to the tragedie-lyrique, and played an important role in establishing the form of French opera. In October 1911, Richard Strauss and his librettist Hugo von Hofmannsthal decided on the subject of their next project. Hofmannsthal suggested that they make a two-act adaptation of Le bourgeois gentilhomme. The play would be performed with new instrumental music by Strauss, and the concluding ballet entertainment, the Ballet des Nations, of Moliere's original would take the form of a new opera, Ariadne auf Naxos, to be created by Hofmannsthal and Strauss.