Fantaisie Op.79 (1898)

Andantino - Allegro

Fauré’s Fantaisie is one of the many similarly attractive pieces written for the annual competitions for students of the instrumental classes at the Paris Conservatoire. While it is not a particularly distinguished example of the composer’s art – unlike, say, Debussy’s clarinet Rhapsodie or Messiaen’s Le merle noir, both ot which were commissioned for the concours – it does reveal an unfamiliar side of the then professor of composition and future director of the Conservatoire. The melodiously expressive E minor introduction to the Fantaisie represents the Fauré we know, not least from the Pelléas et Mélisande incidental music he was writing at much the same time. On the other hand, in writing the bravura Allegro section, a necessary feature of the competition pieces at the time, he clearly had to defy his natural dislike of virtuosity for its own sake – which, in a brilliant little scherzo, he did with more than a little wit and elegance.