Composers › Maurice Ravel › Programme note
Chanson écossaise (1910)
Gerald Larner wrote 2 versions of differing length — choose one below.
Quel galant m’est comparable (1904)
Chanson des cueilleuses de lentisques (1904)
Tou gai! (1906)
Fascination (1904)
Vocalise-étude en forme de habanera (1907)
As the son of a Basque mother, Ravel had been aware of Basque and Spanish folk song from his early childhood and, indeed, he drew on the Spanish idiom in some of his earliest pieces, like the Habanera for two pianos in 1895. He showed little interest in the folk music of other countries, however, until he was asked to do an emergency job in providing piano accompaniments for a selection of Greek songs in 1904. Two of those arrangements were incorporated in the Cinq Mélodies populaires greques in 1906.
Having enjoyed some success with this essentially modest form of composition, Ravel was invited to take part in a competition organised by the Maison du Lied in Moscow in 1910 with the aim of encouraging exemplary harmonisations of folk melodies from seven different countries. He won first prize in four of the categories - Spanish, French, Italian and Hebraic - and published the winning entries as his Chants populaires. Although his losing entries - Russian, Flemish and Scottish - have disappeard, Chanson écossaise was reconstructed from a sketch by the American Ravel scholar Arbie Orenstein and first performed in New York in 1975. Based on a melancholy Burns song, “The Banks o’ Doon,” it is good example of Ravel’s discretion in harmonising the vocal line and his wit in furnishing the piano part. He amuses himself with a little fantasy on the “Scotch snap” in the introduction but after the entry of the voice, while he retains the motif, he restricts the harmonies to the basic requirements of the melody.
Of the five Greek folk-song arrangements Ravel made in 1904 - in a hurried effort to provide illustrations for a lecture by the musicologist Pierre Aubry - Quel galant m’est comparable and Chanson des cueilleuses de lentisques are the two he thought worthy of publication two years later. Bagpipes are to be heard here too, in this case as an affectionately ironic commentary on the posturing lover in Quel galant. The Chanson des cueilleuses de lentiques is a contrastingly modest arrangement of the adoring song of the peasant girl harmonised largely in fifths and scrupulously observant of the modal nature of the melodic line. One of the three new arrangements added when Ravel was commissioned to provide a series of five such settings in 1906, Tout gai! is the cheerful, entirely unpretentious and yet vividly colourful finale to the set.
While Ravel’s folk-song arrangements are exercises in avoiding sentimentality, Fascination is an exercise in cultivating it, and very well done too, whoever wrote it. Although it has always been attributed to the commercial song composer Raoul Marchetti, according to Roger Nichols - who was let into the secret by Ravel’s pupil Manuel Rosenthal - it was ghosted for Marchetti by Ravel in his hard-up student days in 1904. Whatever the truth of that - and Rosenthal is not an infallible witness - it is certainly a distinguished example of the Parisian slow waltz that was so popular in the café-concert of the day. And if Satie was capable of producing Je te veux, Ravel was certainly capable of Fascination.
When Ravel was asked to write something for a collection of wordless songs (or vocalises) in 1907 he was in the early stages of work on his opera L’Heure espagnole, one of the most prominent characters of which is much given to extended vocalisation in habanera rhythm. So it is not surprising that he chose to make his contribution a Vocalise en forme de habanera. Most effective in its original vocal version, it also exists in a variety of instrumental arrangements - none of them by Ravel himself - in which case it is identified as Pièce en forme de habanera.
From Gerald Larner’s files: “Chanson écossaise”
Quel galant m’est comparable (1904)
Chanson des cueilleuses de lentisques (1904)
Tou gai! (1906)
Fascination (1904)
Vocalise-étude en forme de habanera (1907)
As the son of a Basque mother, Ravel had been aware of Basque and Spanish folk song from his early childhood and, indeed, he drew on the Spanish idiom in some of his earliest pieces, like the Habanera for two pianos in 1895. He showed little interest in the folk music of other countries, however, until he was asked to do an emergency job in providing piano accompaniments for a selection of Greek songs in 1904. Two of those arrangements were incorporated in the Cinq Mélodies populaires greques in 1906.
Having enjoyed some success with this essentially modest form of composition, Ravel was invited to take part in a competition organised by the Maison du Lied in Moscow in 1910 with the aim of encouraging exemplary harmonisations of folk melodies from seven different countries. He won first prize in four of the categories - Spanish, French, Italian and Hebraic - and published the winning entries as his Chants populaires. Although the losing entries - Russian, Flemish and Scottish - have disappeard, Chanson écossaise was reconstructed from a sketch by the American Ravel scholar Arbie Orenstein and first performed in New York in 1975. Based on a melancholy Burns song, “The Banks o’ Doon,” it is good example of Ravel’s discretion in harmonising the vocal line and his wit in furnishing the piano part. He amuses himself with a little fantasy on the “Scotch snap” in the introduction but after the entry of the voice, while he retains the motif, he restricts the harmonies to the basic requirements of the melody.
Of the five Greek folk-song arrangements Ravel made in 1904 - in a hurried effort to provide illustrations for a lecture by the musicologist Pierre Aubry - Quel galant m’est comparable and Chanson des cueilleuses de lentisques are the two he thought worthy of publication two years later. Bagpipes are to be heard here too, in this case as an affectionately ironic commentary on the posturing lover in Quel galant. The Chanson des cueilleuses de lentisques is a contrastingly modest arrangement of the adoring song of the peasant girls harmonised largely in fifths and scrupulously observant of the modal nature of the melodic line. One of the three new arrangements added when Ravel was commissioned to provide a series of five such settings in 1906, Tout gai! is the cheerful, entirely unpretentious and yet vividly colourful finale to the set. The French translations of the original Greek texts, incidentally, are by M.D. Calvocoressi, who commissioned the arrangements.
While Ravel’s folk-song arrangements are exercises in avoiding sentimentality, Fascination is an exercise in cultivating it, and very well done too, whoever wrote it. Although it has always been attributed to the commercial song composer Raoul Marchetti, according to Roger Nichols - who was let into the secret by Ravel’s pupil Manuel Rosenthal - it was ghosted for Marchetti by Ravel in his hard-up student days in 1904. Whatever the truth of that - and Rosenthal is not an infallible witness - it is certainly a distinguished example of the Parisian slow waltz that was so popular in the café-concert of the day. And if Satie was capable of producing Je te veux, Ravel was certainly capable of Fascination.
When Ravel was asked to write something for a collection of wordless songs (or vocalises) in 1907 he was in the early stages of work on his opera L’Heure espagnole, one of the most prominent characters of which is much given to extended vocalisation in habanera rhythm. So it is not surprising that he chose to make his contribution a Vocalise en forme de habanera. Most effective in its original vocal version, it also exists in a variety of instrumental arrangements - none of them by Ravel himself - in which case it is identified as Pièce en forme de habanera.
From Gerald Larner’s files: “Mélodies pop greques/3,4,5”