Colin Matthews’ Seven Songs, orchestrations of music by Gabriel Fauré, are available ahead of the 100-year anniversary of Fauré’s death in 2024. Seven Songs sees settings of Verlaine, Prudhomme, Auguste Villiers De L’isle-Adam, and Silvestre arranged for soprano and small orchestra, complemented by an instrumental postlude based on Fauré’s Barcarolle no. 12 (1915). Matthews’ orchestration draws on songs from the middle period of Fauré’s career, from 1879’s ‘Notre Amour’ and ‘Les Berceaux’ to 1891’s ‘Green’ and ‘Mandoline’.
The 17-minute collection is characteristically vivid in its use of the orchestral palette. ‘Mandoline’, a setting of Verlaine, sees a flutter of pizzicato strings evoke the titular instrument in their accompanying figures. The final movement contains an optional part for crotales, adding a glint of magic and mystery to Matthews’ ethereal setting of Prudhomme’s 'Les berceaux'. A perusal score is available to view here.
Matthews captured the intimacy of Fauré’s works in a delicate mix of 19th and 21st centuries… Fleur-jetée reworked the insistent piano in the horn section in an urgent concatenation of emotions… a fine complement to the original settings.
The Times (Sarah Unwin Jones), 15 February 2001
Seven Songs is an important contribution to the relatively slender selection of orchestral works by Fauré available to programme; they complement Matthews’ expert orchestrations of other fin de siècle and early twentieth-century French piano works in Debussy’s Préludes and Ravel’s Miroirs.
The set was commissioned by the Scottish Chamber Orchestra and premiered by Sally Matthews and Robin Ticciati in 2010; they have received subsequent performances from Natalie Dessay, Hannu Lintu, and the Finnish Radio Symphony Orchestra and Siobahn Stagg with the Tasmanian Symphony Orchestra.