Poulenc's Concerto for Organ

[Gerhard Griesel]

I regard Poulenc's Concerto for Organ, Strings and Tympani as the most beautiful piece of music I have ever heard. And yet, I have never heard anyhting else by Poulenc that I like. Any comment on the merits of Poulenc as a composer?

Gerhard

[Kriton]

I regard Poulenc's Concerto for Organ, Strings and Tympani as the most beautiful piece of music I have ever heard. And yet, I have never heard anyhting else by Poulenc that I like. Any comment on the merits of Poulenc as a composer?

Gerhard

...only that I consider him an anti-romantic composer!

There's only one piece of him I adore as much as I dislike the rest: "L'Embarquement pour Cythère" for 2 Pianos. Gay, harmless, and funny!

[Hovite]

Gay, harmless, and funny!

Is that a description of Poulenc or his music?

I find his work variable. Those pieces that I admire are

Aubade
Concert champêtre
Concerto for organ
Concerto for piano
Concerto for two pianos
Sinfonietta

On the other hand, there was one CD that I picked up that was simply dreadful, and was immediately thrown out. I think that kangaroos were involved.

[John Hudock]

I suppose it's a matter of taste but I love quite a lot of Poulenc's music.

He was not very prolific, but his Gloria is a magnificent work and the Stabat Mater is quite moving too. I like all of the concertos, particularly the Organ concerto, the Harpsichord concerto (Champetre) and the piano concertos and also his Sinfonietta. I also like his ballet music and while not very familiar with his operas I remember finding La Voix Humane, which I haven't listened to in years, quite moving. I also there is much worthwhile in his chamber music as well.

[Revilod]

I'm a big fan of Poulenc. He has a style entirely his own. I think it was Richard Rodney Bennett who once said that he thought he could imitate the style of all the great composers except for Poulenc. If you don't know it, try his ballet suite "Les Animaux Modeles" and I guarantee you'll be hooked.

[eschiss1]

I think the first Poulenc work I heard-  an odd sort of parallel with Reinecke here... - was probably his flute sonata. (That or maybe the organ concerto in fact Did do a lot of radio listening especially in my early college days - well, until just very recently, but especially then - and one of those works caught my memory, as did his Stabat Mater soon after.)

A lot to be said about Poulenc I guess even if or rather especially if one is interested, such as that, I gather, there's pre-1936 and post-1935 (so to speak) Poulenc (Ferroud's death is said to have had a very strong effect on him). The 1937 Mass in G is an early product of this, I also gather. (Though of the various works on a Martin/Poulenc choral works disc on Nimbus it is the Martin mass I do return to most often. There are still a number of Poulenc works I treasure- and those duo sonatas are probably among them... Ah well!)

[JimL]

I sang in the Gloria in the UCLA Chorus (it would have been nice to sing it with orchestra, but I think we just had a piano or two).  Although often wry and sardonic in his instrumental and orchestral music (the "anti-romantic streak spoken of previously) he was capable of ineffable eloquence in some of it, and particularly in his vocal works.  I consider his opera Les Dialogues des Carmelites to be one of the greatest works of its type to come out of the 20th Century.

[Delicious Manager]

Sometimes Poulenc can sound like a sort of Gallic Stravinsky. He was something of a musical magpie, flitting between various styles and influences. However, he wrote some beautiful music. Among those I would recommend to lovers of the Organ Concerto would be:

Piano Concerto (a gorgeous slow movement to rival that from Ravel's G major concerto)
Mass (for a capella choir (shares some musical material with the Organ Concerto and the Gloria)
Flute Sonata

[TerraEpon]

Poulenc's Double Piano Concerto also has a lovely middle movement, though it's a bit less....uh...bold?

[chill319]

Poulenc when young was perhaps the truest of Les Six to Satie's deconstructive aesthetic. Unlike Satie, he developed a broad sentimental streak as he aged, so that his deliberate use of the banal went from being brusque and humorous in his earlier works (like the 2 piano concerto) to a bit purple in some of his later ones.

I think his keyboard style from the 1920s on shows the marked influence of early Prokofiev (Sarcasms, Visions fugitives, etc.) as well as traces of other composers. In the case of the Organ Concerto, though, I believe Marcel Duruflé had significant input into the keyboard style. 

To my ears Poulenc is less of a Gallic Stravinsky than, say, Frank Martin.  In any event, Poulenc's brief tenure among unsung composers has long since ended. His name would be writ moderately large in a tag cloud of performed 20th-century composers.

[Peter1953]

In the late 1970s and the first half of the 1980s there was a radio program (I cannot recall what is was all about). I loved the opening tune. No idea of what it was. Of course I could have written to the program makers, but I didn't. After some years I heard a broadcast of Poulenc's PC and indeed, I recognized the main theme of the 2nd movement.
About ten years ago I bought the double Decca CD with some of Poulenc's works, including that PC, the Concerto for two Pianos in D minor (the slow movement is not that bad at all), the Organ Concerto and so on. I've listened to both CDs only twice, today for the second time and not even everything. I just don't like Poulenc, not even that 2nd movement of his PC (the theme is nice, but not its development). Poulenc doesn't appeal to me. But I think he has a style of his own: attractive and subtle musical moments, sudden and odd changes in atmosphere, and a cacophony of noise succeeding each other.

[JimL]

Back in the days of KFAC (before KUSC became the sole classical station here in L.A.), there was a show on the aforementioned station that used the opening "Sunrise" theme from the ballet Les Animaux Modeles.  I never knew what it was until I heard it on KUSC years later.  Poulenc truly could spin some great tunes, and that is one of them.  He reminds me of Raff, in a way - eclectic, yet distinctive.  Speaking of JJR, Time-Warner Cable's Classical Masterpieces Channel played the Stadlmaier/Bamberger Lenore last night.

[jerfilm]

I'm with John - my favorites are the Gloria and the Stabat Mater.  The concertos come in second.  I discovered Poulenc in college when the Carleton Choir did the Stabat Mater - Dr. Henry Woodward had transcribed the orchestra part for the four manual organ in the chapel.  It was quite an eye opener for me.

[cjvinthechair]

Hi, I'm new !
Can't agree with you about Poulenc, though. Try the unaccompanied motets. At least one of those can be on autoplay at my funeral any time !