CD REVIEW – GEORGES BIZET L’ARLÉSIENNE
SOMM SOMMCD 0682 [73:28]

This is an interesting album, a reissue of an EMI now Warner Classics release recorded in 1985. Some readers will be familiar with the two charming suites of music – one compiled by the composer, the other by Ernest Guiraud – that Bizet (1838-75) wrote for Alphonse Daudet's play. Based on a true event, it tells the heartbreaking story of Frédéri, who loves the Girl from Arles but cannot have her and so chooses death for himself. Not too big a surprise, then, that it was a flop!

Here there is all the incidental music for the play from the original 1872 manuscript, reconstructed by Dominique Riffaud. These less familiar pieces share the attractiveness of the suites in a very good EMI recording.

The excellent quality of the playing by the Orchestre national du Capitole de Toulouse under their then principal conductor, Michel Plasson (b 1933, Paris), is matched on five tracks by the choral singing of Orféon Donostiarra, chorus master Antxon Ayestarán. Saxophonist Jacques Noureddine also deserves a mention for the Prélude that opens with the Provençal Christmas carol March of the Kings.

There is an added bonus track as the album concludes with a fascinating new 21½ minute dramatized adaptation of Daudet's original short story narrated by musician and documentary maker, Jon Tolansky, who also wrote the lucid liner notes.

Well done to SOMM for making this desirable disc available again.

© Peter Burt, January 2024