Composed in 1939, Paul Hindemith’s Six Chansons for a cappella choir are an ode to nature, concord, and neighborhood.
Set to French-language poems by the Austrian author, Rainer Maria Rilke (1875-1926), they provide a dreamy remembrance of the music of the Renaissance and the French chanson. Temporary, easy, and serene, that is music of escape.
Having fled the Nazis, Hindemith was dwelling amid the Alpine splendor of Valais, Switzerland. Months later, he immigrated to the USA, the place he taught at Yale College.
Brian McCurdy writes that Hindemith
believed that unaccompanied singing was each an essential instructing instrument and a helpful neighborhood exercise. For this explicit set of chansons, he deliberately stored the half writing and harmonies easy and accessible sufficient for a choir of any means to have the ability to carry out it.
The six poems focus on animals, the seasons, and panorama. The primary music, La biche (“The Doe”), evokes the animal’s grace and energy, starting with the traces, “Oh, a doe: what stunning interiors of historical forests abound in your eyes.” That is contrasted with Un cygne (“The Swan”), which “advances over the water utterly surrounded by [reflections] of itself.” The third music, Puisque tout passe, is quick and fleeting. (“Since all the things passes, allow us to make fleeting melody; the one which refreshes us will get the higher of us. Allow us to sing that which is leaving us with love and artwork; allow us to be faster than its swift departure”). The harmonious blessings of Printemps (“Springtime”) distinction with loss of life En hiver (“In Winter”). The cycle concludes with Verger (“Orchard”), sunny and life-sustaining.
Listed below are the poems, with English translation.
Recordings
- Hindemith: Six Chansons, Marcus Creed, SWR Vokalensemble Stuttgart Amazon
Featured Picture: “Little mountain lake, view of the Bernese Alps” (1860), Alexandre Calame
