FRANCK, César, Plaintes des Israélites CFF 181

In the field of religious, essentially biblical, choral music, César Franck composed several works of varying importance between 1845 and 1880. Ruth, “églogue biblique” (1845, revised 1860) was his first attempt at sacred oratorio. In 1859 he wrote Les sept paroles du Christ sur la croix (title not his), then in the mid-1860s he composed three biblical choral works, the Plaintes des Israélites, Cantique de Moïse and La Tour de Babel. Unlike Les sept paroles, these three short pieces are warm and demonstrative, and since the emphasis is placed in each case on the most visual and narrative aspects of the text, they are both musically rich and humanly captivating, thus heralding the style of Les Béatitudes, the oratorio he was to compose four years later. Franck’s last religious work is Rébecca, a “scène biblique” written in 1880, which again takes up a passage from Genesis; his writing of the choruses confirms his particular talent for lending drama and humanity to biblical subjects.

For choir, soloists (BB) and orchestra

Matériel en préparation