Tuesday April 24, from 12 am to 1 pm
Salle Polyvalente
Songs by Vaughan Williams
Lieder by Cornelius and Mahler
Melodies by Duparc and Poulenc
- Matthias Geissbühler, baritone
- Stephanie Gurga, piano
For the young heart the world is like the side of a road.
Ever passing, it travels.
With this programme, the musicians present a selection of the finest melodies on the theme of
wandering. In the accompaniment resonates the sound trace of the wanderer’s steps. One hears
quarter notes, sometimes heavy and sometimes cheerful, which either reflect the feelings of the
narrator or the nature that surrounds them, one hears sixteenth notes that blow like the wind or
flow like a river – a musical allegory of peregrinations.
The principal component, Songs of Travel by Vaughan Williams on the poems by Robert Louis
Stevenson, tells in short fragments the life of a vagabond for whom the road beneath his feet and
the vast sky above him are the most important things in his life. The cycle also talks about his
beloved and brings us through flowery language to Stevenson’s native country : Scotland.
The programme is completed with different composers and melodies. Henri Duparc invites us to a
voyage with Charles Baudelaire’s eponymic poem, Invitation au voyage. Lieder from Schubert and
Mendelssohn paint in short fragments scenes of people in search of happiness from love. The
musicians also interpret two Lieder by Peter Cornelius – a German composer who is too seldom
played ; a master of poetry and music. The opening of the programme makes no exception and
will be an excerpt from « Lieder eines fahrenden Gesellen » (Songs from a wandering companion)
by Gustav Mahler.
G. Mahler – Ging heut morgen übers Feld
H. Duparc – L’invitation au voyage
F. Mendelssohn – Reiselied (op. 34)
E. Grieg – Ensom Vandrer (op. 43)
P. Cornelius – Möcht’ im Walde mit dir geh’n (op. 4/3)
P. Cornelius – Komm, wir wandeln zusammen im Mondschein (op. 4/2)
F. Schubert – Der Wanderer (D 493)
F. Schubert – Wanderer-Fantasie (D 760/2)
R. Vaughan-Williams – Songs of travel