MD Christian Fitzner: Musical direction
Central German Chamber Philharmonic Orchestra Schönebeck
Philharmonic Chamber Orchestra Wernigerode
Mélanie Bonis: Trois femmes de légende
Maurice Ravel : Ma mère l’ove
César Franck : Symphony in D minor
“I would never have believed that a woman could write something like this. She knows all the clever tricks of the composer’s trade.” This quote from Camille Saint-Saens after a performance of Mel Bonis’ Piano Quartet speaks volumes about the time when this gifted and exceedingly industrious composer wrote over 300 works that are largely sought in vain on concert programs today. Her biography is as exciting as a novel by Hugo or Dumas, only against the will of her family, she studied composition with Ernest Guiraud in Paris at the initiative of César Franck. Forced into a marriage against her will, which made her the stepmother of five children, she led a double life between a demure housewife and a creative musician throughout her life. At first, her works are still very much indebted to the tonal style of late Romanticism, as is characteristic of the Symphony in D minor by her mentor César Franck, but more and more her oeuvre moves into the impressionistic realms of a Claude Debussy or Maurice Ravel, whose fairy-tale tales of “Mother Goose” are also on the program today.
The three portraits of strong women are among the composer’s most poetic and sonically intense works.