Florent Schmitt’s Quatre lieds (1912): Dark colors and wistful sonorities depicting cryptic, fathomless poetry.

Throughout his lengthy career as a composer, Florent Schmitt would return again and again to the human voice when creating his compositions.  Although Schmitt distanced himself from operatic projects (he created no operas of his own although he  prepared piano-reduction scores of several of Frederick Delius’ operatic scores), Schmitt lavished attention on sorts of other […]

Investigating the mystery – and promise – of Florent Schmitt’s “Poèmes des lacs” (Les Barques, Demande, Musique sur l’eau, Soir sur le lac, Tristesse au jardin — 1897-1901)

Recently, two documents have emerged that point to the existence of a long-forgotten grouping of Florent Schmitt’s mélodies that can stand alongside the song cycles of fellow-French composers Henri Duparc, Claude Debussy, Maurice Ravel, Maurice Delage and Louis Aubert. The grouping of Florent Schmitt mélodies carries the umbrella title “Poèmes des lacs,” and some details […]