Alfredo Casella - The Songs of 'Parisian Years' (Lorna Windsor; Raffaele Cortesi)

Information

Composer: Alfredo Casella

• Cinq Lyriques, Op. 2
• La Cloche fêlée, Op. 7
• Trois Lyriques, Op. 9
• Sonnet, Op. 16
• Due Canti, Op. 21
• Deux Chansons Anciennes, Op. 22
• L'Adieu à la vie, Op. 26

Lorna Windsor, soprano

Raffaele Cortesi, piano

Date: 2018

Label: Tactus

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Description

This disc presents a fascinating glimpse into Alfredo Casella’s rarely explored realm of vocal chamber music, revealing the evolution of his artistic personality during his long “Parisian years.” Spanning nearly two decades, Casella’s time in Paris was formative: it exposed him to a wealth of European musical traditions and aesthetics far removed from his Italian roots. Unlike his contemporaries Malipiero and Pizzetti—who also sought to renew Italian music—Casella’s development was shaped by immersion in the cosmopolitan environment of early 20th-century Paris. Originally trained as a pianist, Casella gradually established himself as a composer of note, admired for his versatility but sometimes criticized for his stylistic changeability, influenced by both French impressionism and Central European symphonic modernism, especially Mahler.

Casella later described this period as one “rich in all European experiences,” encompassing influences from Strauss, Schönberg, Mahler, and Hungarian and Spanish traditions. This diversity underpins the playful stylistic parodies of works like À la manière de… and Nove pezzi op. 24, where he experimented with composing “in the manner of” various composers—yet ultimately sought to write à la manière de soi-même (“in his own manner”). His Parisian period thus reveals a restless curiosity and “taste for stylistic adventures” that persisted throughout his life, as noted by critic Massimo Mila, forming a coherent thread through his seemingly non-linear artistic evolution.

Casella’s lieder for voice and piano serve as a sensitive record of this phase. Immersed in the French mélodie tradition, he combined refined literary taste with experimental harmonic design. His early cycle Cinq Lyriques (1902–1903) sets poems by fashionable writers such as Richepin, Lorrain, and de Croisset, reflecting contemporary symbolist sensibilities. Musically, however, Casella pushed beyond imitation of Debussy or Fauré, displaying freer structural designs, dense harmonic textures, and a restless piano style that often surpassed the poems’ emotional range. This independent piano writing—powerful, rhythmically alive, and polyphonic—became a hallmark of his style. Later songs such as La cloche fêlée (Baudelaire, 1904) and Soleils couchants (Verlaine, 1905) show his growing command of emotional intensity and harmonic ambiguity.

By 1910, Casella’s setting of Ronsard’s Sonnet reveals a shift toward classical clarity and modal harmony, inspired by the revival of French musical antiquity. Two years later, Deux chansons anciennes (1912)—folk-inspired harmonizations composed for a Parisian competition—display his interest in integrating folk elements, echoing Mahler’s influence on his earlier orchestral works. The piano writing in these songs remains inventive, charged with dissonance, and psychologically expressive.

The later Paris years mark a darker, more introspective turn. Works such as Le couvent sur l’eau (1913) and Notte di Maggio (1912–13) announce Casella’s transition to his “second manner,” characterized by expressionistic intensity and polyharmonic experimentation. Critics like Vuillermoz praised Notte di Maggio for its “disturbing virtuosity,” while Casella himself viewed it as a decisive step toward freeing himself from “romantic rhetoric” and reconnecting with his Italian identity. His Due canti on poems by Carducci (1913) confirm this synthesis, extending his vocal idiom into orchestral textures.

Casella’s fascination with new harmonic frontiers reached its apex in L’adieu à la vie (1914), based on Tagore’s L’offrande lyrique in André Gide’s translation. Here, Casella sought to express a spiritual farewell through complex polytonal harmonies, exploring the “tonal doubt” stirred in him by Schoenberg’s innovations—though his “Italian nature,” as he confessed, kept him from full atonality. These four songs, later orchestrated, embody Casella’s search for continuity within harmonic modernism: his belief that modulation could occur through simultaneity rather than succession of chords.

This late Parisian phase, marked by a mood of existential anxiety, foreshadowed the mature Casella. As Guido Turchi observed, the “feeling of death” haunting Notte di Maggio and Adieu à la vie—with their expressionistic descent into spiritual void—would resurface decades later, transfigured by serenity, in Tre canti (1943) and the Missa solemnis Pro pace (1944). Thus, Casella’s Paris years emerge as both the crucible of his stylistic plurality and the seedbed of the deeper human tensions that shaped his lifelong artistic quest.

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Alfredo Casella (25 July 1883 – 5 March 1947) was an Italian composer, pianist and conductor. He studied in Paris under Louis Diémer and Gabriel Fauré before returning to Italy in 1914 to teach at the Conservatorio Santa Cecilia in Rome. From 1927 to 1929, he served as principal conductor of the Boston Pops. Casella played a key role in reviving interest in Antonio Vivaldi's music, notably through organizing the 1939 Vivaldi Week. A major figure in the Neoclassical revival, his own compositions were deeply influenced by earlier Italian music. His notable works include La Giara, Paganiniana, and concertos for various instruments.

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Lorna Windsor is a British soprano. She began her musical journey studying piano and viola before training in Lieder and opera at the Guildhall School in London. She has performed at major international venues and festivals, singing works by Salieri with Frans Brüggen and Bach under Gustav Leonhardt, and recording Les Motets de Versailles by Blanchard. Her operatic roles include Monteverdi and Peri's Euridice in Paris, as well as key Mozart roles such as Donna Anna, Despina and Venus. A specialist in Lieder, she is also acclaimed for her work in experimental contemporary music and theatre.

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Raffaele Cortesi is an Italian musician and vocal coach. He studied Musicology and refined his skills with renowned teachers such as Sergio Perticaroli and Bruno Canino. He has performed at prestigious venues like Teatro alla Scala, Teatro S. Carlo, and international festivals in Tokyo, Seoul and London. Cortesi has accompanied prominent singers, including Raina Kabaivanska and Michele Pertusi, and recorded works such as Verdi's songs and Rossini's Petite Messe Solennelle. He collaborates with major radio and TV networks and serves as vocal coach for leading opera houses, including Teatro Regio and Arena di Verona.

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