As authentic as green Guinness, but good to hear
Album Of The WeekFrom the Lebrecht Album of the Week:
… My pick of the week may appear esoteric. It comes from Ludwigshafen in western Germany and is performed by the Deutsche Staatsphilharmonie Rheinland-Pfalz with its British chief conductor Michael Francis.
The composer is an Irishwoman who lived in Paris in the second half of the 19th century and is all but forgotten in both of her patrimonies….
Read on here.
And here.
En francais ici.
Michael Francis is a marvelous conductor, and Holmes was highly praised by Liszt, among others. I look forward to hearing the disc. The review reads as a rave, but it got only 3 stars — what gives? Is that because of the harp in the Polish tone poem?
Uh…seems that I bought a disk of Holmes’ music on the Marco Polo some 30 years ago. Same orchestra, different conductors. Some duplication of repertoire? Interesting composer and her music is lot better than a lot of the dreck from that era that is also long forgotten. I know no “devout Catholics” who had children out of wedlock. Guess my definition of “devout” is out of date.
When I was a schoolgirl, a friend’s sister had several children out of wedlock. The family was very devoutly Catholic. The sister, who professed to be, maintained that as a Catholic she could not use birth control. She did not appear to understand that, as a Catholic, she would have been enjoined against sex outside marriage.
I doubt Augusta Holmès was quite that stupid, but I agree that her devoutness did not appear to include playing by the rules.
It’s Roland Furieux in French, but the epic poem by Ariosto is universally known as Orlando Furioso in English.
And neologisms are hard, but I think your “Wagnerolatory ” could better dispose of the final “o.”
However, a fascinating introduction to an interesting-sounding composer and personality.