Léo Ferré - 100 Years, 6. Music - Requiem, Beethoven, Conductor, L'Opéra du Pauvre, Les Vieux Copains

In 1975 Léo Ferré (1916 - 1993) started conducting the Orchestre de l’Institut des Hautes Études Musicales de Montreux and took them for performances to Belgium and France.  He later conducted Royal Philharmonic Orchestra of Liège, and the Pasdeloup Orchestra in Paris for his only instrumental album Ferré muet dirige… (A silent Ferré conducts...).

   Sometimes Ferré sang at the same time. He mixed Ravel and Beethoven with his own compositions, and changed the placement of the orchestra. Up to 140 musicians and choristers were on the stage.  The halls were filled for several weeks.  But, music critics not from the classical music world were not ready for change and rejected it as a strange misalliance. Ferré was deeply hurt and had trouble mounting this type of events.  He would remain disappointed about this experience. ⁽¹⁾

   Here is Ferré in 1977 conducting at the Avant-Garde Festival ⁽²⁾ in Ivry-sur-Seine.



Requiem (1976) is a tributes to the passing of time, the signs of old age, those killed in their prime, to computers and cardiograms, for all the passions, wealth and status. The piece builds up to a climax:

For hate rising from the depth of habit
For this careless century three quarts uncovered
For the billions of fools who make solitude

   And then Ferré speaks: For all this, silence. In this last sentence, the title Requiem (Latin for I rest, traditionally the Mass for the Death), becomes clear.



Muss es sein? Es muss sein! (Must it be? It must be!) (1976) is a passionate plea to make music available to the street.

   Ferré asks where music can now be found?

In posh salons with venerated chandeliers?
In secret concerts with crinoline secrets?
In bygone times with shady corners?
In conquered palaces with cuddly conquests?

That's where it swoons
That's where it's holed up

We want it in the street.

And it will come there!

And we will have it, Music.

Must it be? It must be!

   The German quote was found on Beethoven's manuscript of his last string quartet, String Quartet No. 16 in f major, Op. 135.

   Ferré fears music is dying. It can now be found at the Polytechnique between two equations, Boulez in its shop, a minister of state in its lapel.

Dans la rue, la Musique!
Music? in the street!

La Musica? nelle strade!

BEETHOVEN STRASS!

In Ludwig (1982) Ferré recalls how he was brought to tears as a youngster listening to Beethoven's Egmont Overture, the story of the downfall of the Count of Egmont, a man who trusted in the goodness of those around him. ⁽³⁾ The work appeared in the triple album Ludwig - L'Imaginaire - Le Bateau ivre. It was originally conceived as an introduction for a new edition of Beethoven's Notebooks relating Ferré's childhood memories: ⁽⁴⁾

I was young, fourteen or fifteen. I was in the second year of high school. I was in a French school in Italy, twelve miles from the border. Is was a French school of the Christian Brothers, forgive me for talking about it! One day, three of us were walking. And then, the guy waved at us. We could speak, but when we had to stop, we stopped. Can you imagine? I lived through that! We were told: "Don't talk!" And we didn't talk. An we were by the Mediterranean Sea, not much sand, there was gravel. One day I listened to the Egmont Overture, and I listened, and then cried. I cried and I was hiding because we couldn't cry for something internal, like that. They laughed at us. Then we went back to class, and the teacher said: "Well, today, what did you do?" I told my story. And that guy, Beethoven, his name was Bitoveine… Bitoveine! He made fun of me. That's why I wrote this, not too long ago. It came back to me like that. That's why I like Egmont and Beethoven, of course! But I only want to do it with an orchestra. I can do it with a band. I did it at the Canada Course with the Orchestra of Montréal. And it pleased me very much to do it. And I did it crying, because I remembered... I was young again."

   And he remembers seeing Toscanini at a rehearsal in Monaco, and writes in Vous savez qui je suis maintenant (Do you know know who I am):

If you aren't Beethoven, you can't play Beethoven. The message of great masters is a collective will which multiplies in the memory of man. Death is a non-story. Beethoven is dead, you have to support him, he runs in your veins. Beethoven dead, he is born again in you, musician. He is through you. Be Beethoven and play, and it's good! ... I wrote this for the musicians. And I found the quote, I don't only write what I like best, (this is Beethoven speaking) but what I need, because of money.

   During the song Ferré and Beethoven blend. Ferré imagines he is Beethoven.



L'Opéra du Pauvre (Opera of the Poor Man) (1983) was a four-record album for voices and orchestra. It is a 'dreamlike and wry plea in favor of the Night, symbol of imagination and subversiveness for Ferré and synthesizes all aspects of the French poet and musician.'⁽⁵⁾

   At its origin lies a lyric ballet written in 1956 for the choreographer Roland Petit, later turned into a serialized lyrical novel. When Ferré revives it in 1982 he adds many things and creates a new, resolutely baroque work of vast dimensions. At the end of the recording he adds a ballad for violin and orchestra Le Chant du hibou (The song of the owl).





Let's conclude with a late, nostalgic song Les vieux copains (Old friends) (1990). We hear a beautiful trumpet, soft strings, and reminiscences blending together in counterpoint, just like our memories do as the years go by.


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⁽¹⁾ French Wikipedia entry. (https://fr.wikipedia.org/wiki/L%C3%A9o_Ferr%C3%A9 (08/28/2016))