For many classical music lovers, nothing can compare to a live performance.  While studio recordings promise greater precision and better sound quality — along with the absence of distracting audience noise – often this comes at the expense of spontaneity and immediacy.

And for a piece of music as viscerally thrilling as Florent Schmitt’s Psalm XLVII, Op. 38, composed in 1904, the excitement is even more exhilarating in a live presentation. But concert performances of this music are still quite rare.

Fortunately for us, the full measure of excitement is captured in more than a dozen live recordings of this music that are currently available on CD, via high-res download or uploaded on YouTube. Even better, they’re directed by some of classical music’s great conductors — among them Désiré Inghelbrecht, Jean Martinon, Eugene Ormandy, Jean Fournet, Louis Frémaux, Vladimir Fedoseyev, Leon Botstein and Fabien Gabel.

Here are details on each of these live recordings, along with links to where they can be heard or purchased:

Désiré Inghelbrecht/L’Orchestre National de l’O.R.T.F. & Chorus (1951, 1957, 1958 and 1964):

These performances are historically important in that this conductor was the one who gave the world premiere performance of Psalm XLVII back in 1906.

Maestro Inghelbrecht would return to the score numerous times in the ensuing decades, culminating in a 1951 performance, another in 1957, a 1958 Schmitt memorial concert, plus a later 1964 concert the conductor gave a short time before his own death.

While the three performances are a bit rough-hewn, they are well worth hearing.

The 1951 performance was part of musical programming held at the Palais de Chaillot in celebration of International Human Rights Day, an event that was attended by worldwide dignateries including former First Lady Eleanor Roosevelt. The 1951 performance was preserved and is available from the United Nations Audiovisual Library; it can be accessed here.

Both the 1951 and 1957 Inghelbrecht performances feature the mezzo-soprano Geneviève Moizan, whose dark-hued interpretation of the important vocal solo in the Psaume‘s middle section is rather different from the way we usually hear these passages — and it’s very impressive, indeed.  The1957 broadcast performance is available from St-Laurent Studio in a CD that also includes works by Claude Debussy conducted by Inghelbrecht.

The 1958 performance was part of an O.R.T.F. memorial concert of Florent Schmitt’s music performed two months after his death, which also featured Régine Crespin as the soprano soloist.  The full 90-minute concert, containing the Psaume and four other Schmitt works, is also available from St-Laurent Studio and can be acquired here.

The later 1964 performance by Maestro Inghelbrecht is also available from the French National Radio archives in a high-res download.

Igor Markevitch/French National Radio Orchestra & Chorus (1953):

The Ukrainian-born, French-raised composer and conductor Igor Markevitch led a number of live performances of Psaume XLVII during his stage career. His last performance of the piece was in 1957, but undoubtedly the most famous one was in April 1953, when he was joined by the internationally renowned soprano Elisabeth Schwarzkopf to present the piece with ORTF musical forces at the Théâtre des Champs-Elysées.

Miss Schwarzkopf was not known for being a specialist in French vocal music; still, her performance here is an effective one, and Maestro Markevitch is a fine collaborator in the production. The 1953 performance is now available from Forgotten Records.

Fritz Munch/Strasbourg Municipal Orchestra & Chorus (1954):

One could say that soprano Geneviève Moizan practically “owned” the soprano part to Psaume XLVII during the 1950s and early 1960s after Denise Duval stopped singing it. One of Moizan’s earliest performances of the piece has been released by Forgotten Records. The concert performance dates from 1954 and features the Strasbourg Municipal Orchestra and Chorus under the direction of Fritz Munch. Maestro Munch was the older brother of Charles Munch, whose international career — including a celebrated tenure as music director of the Boston Symphony Orchestra — far eclipsed Fritz’s own career as a conductor and music administrator.

In additional to Moizan’s impressive solo work in this 1954 reading, Fritz Munch’s performance of the final moments of the Psaume is particularly notable in how precisely he follows the composer’s explicit instructions noted in the score regarding quickening the tempo and rhythmic emphasis. Indeed, Munch’s may well be the most effective treatment of those ending measures among all the concert performances of the music that I’ve heard.

Louis Frémaux/Chorale Elisabeth Brasseur + Ensemble Instrumental du Grand-Casino de Vichy (1956):

From the 1930s to the 1960s, the Vichy International Festival was among the most important music festivals in France.  In 1956, the conductor Louis Frémaux brought Florent Schmitt’s Psaume XLVII to the festival, leading a performance that featured soprano Jacqueline Brumaire along with the Chorale Elisabeth Brasseur — the choir group that had made the first commercial recording of the Psaume (with Paris Conservatoire musicians) four years earlier.

The Frémaux is a highly-charged interpretation — so super-exciting, it almost goes off the rails the final moments of the piece.  Despite the untidiness in a few spots, Fremaux’s way with the score makes for an undeniably thrilling experience. It’s been released on the Forgotten Records label and is available for purchase at the label’s website.

Jean Martinon/L’Orchestre National de l’O.R.T.F. & Chorus (1973):

This was the public performance that preceded Jean Martinon’s celebrated recording of the Psalm, released by EMI and still considered a touchstone recording by many music lovers 40 years on.

In the live performance, the huge pipe organ played by famed organist Gaston Litaize is missing, but the overall excitement level is incredibly high.

As in the EMI recording, the live performance features the dazzling soprano soloist Andréa Guiot.

This performance is also available from French Radio and Television, including as a high-res download.  (A low-res version is also available on YouTube.)

Eugene Ormandy/Philadelphia Orchestra + Mendelssohn Club Chorus (1977):

This concert performance, which also features soprano Kathryn Bouleyn, appears to have been very well-received by the audience — if the hearty applause heard at the end of the piece is any indication.

This performance has proven to be rather elusive over the years, but is currently available for purchase through the Music in the Mail website (Disco Archivia #748).

Those interested in investigating Maestro Ormandy’s approach to this work should definitely take action while the recording remains available.

Jean Fournet/Tokyo Metropolitan Symphony Orchestra + Shinyu-kai Chorus (1992): 

The French conductor Jean Fournet was the music director of this Japanese orchestra for many years, during which time he programmed much French music including Schmitt’s Psaume XLVII and La Tragédie de Salomé.

This live concert performance of the Psalm, captured in 1992, has been issued commercially on Fontec, a Japanese CD label.

I consider it the most effective of these eleven live performances based on a combination of the interpretation, musical precision, and sound quality.  The CD recording is available for purchase from Fontec directly.

Jean Fournet/Netherlands Radio Symphony Orchestra + Chorus (1994):

In addition to performing Psaume XLVII in Japan, Maestro Fournet presented the piece in concert in other locales, notably in France and the Netherlands. His February 28, 1994 concert performance with the Netherlands Radio Symphony Orchestra and the Groot Omroepkoor is a tad slower and more stolid than his 1992 Tokyo interpretation, but still quite effective — and he’s given fine support from soprano Françoise Pollet, who also performed the piece with Marc Soustrot and the Orchestre National des Pays de la Loire at the Angers Festival in 1989.

The 1994 Fournet Netherlands performance has been uploaded to YouTube and can be viewed here.

Vladimir Fedoseyev/Vienna Symphony Orchestra + Wiener Singakademie Chorus (1997):

The Russian/Soviet conductor Vladimir Fedoseyev was not exactly known for French music, but on March 6, 1997 he teamed up with soprano Joanna Borowska-Isser and Austrian musicians to present Florent Schmitt’s Psaume XLVII in Vienna. Maestro Fedoseyev’s interpretation comes across as distinctly “Central European,” playing up the dramatic aspects of the music while engaging in rather stolid tempi in many places of the score.

The 1997 Vienna performance was captured as a broadcast aircheck, but didn’t emerge until several decades later when it was uploaded to YouTube. It can be viewed here.

Leon Botstein/American Symphony Orchestra + Bard Festival Chorale (2012):

This live performances is the swiftest interpretation of the Psalm I’ve ever heard.  Perhaps as a result of this, there are a number of places in the the performance when the orchestra, chorus and soprano soloist aren’t quite in sync with one another, which will prove problematic for some listeners’ enjoyment of the musical presentation.

Maestro Botstein first performed this work with the ASO back in 1997 – a concert I was fortunate to attend.  That time he adopted a more “conventional” tempo, which I found more effective — and ultimately more successful.  Still, it’s good to have this 2012 rendition so readily available through Amazon.

Fabien Gabel/Orchestre National de France + Chœur de Radio-France (2022):

The newest live performance of Florent Schmitt’s Psaume XLVII may be the most satisfying one overall — not just beause of the fine interpretation and demonstration audio sound, but also because it’s the first performance of this music ever to be recorded on video.

I was present at the concert which happened on May 12, 2022 at Maison de la Radio in Paris, and can report that the performance so electrified the audience, its ovation practically prevented the musicians from departing the stage. The video, produced by France-Télévisions, captures all the excitement not only in the audiophile sonics, but also in beautiful filmography and camera angles that turn the performance into a feast for the eyes as well as an extraordinary aural experience.

The video of Maestro Gabel’s ONF performance can be accessed here.

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Without doubt, Psaume XLVII is one of the most exhilarating choral works in the musical literature.  Hearing it in the “immediacy” of a live concert atmosphere makes the excitement even more palpable – which is why these “captured” performances are so necessary to hear. Simply put, they’re glorious renditions. You’re missing out on something special if you don’t explore them.