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Psyché was César Franck's fourth and by far most large-scale and most unusual poème symphonique; it was preceded by Les Eolides (1876), Le Chasseur maudit (1882) and Les Djinns (1884) for piano and orchestra (Repertoire Explorer Study Score 119). In 1885 he wrote the Variations symphoniques for piano and orchestra, in the opinion of many connoisseurs his strongest orchestral work. The first ideas for Psyché came to Franck in 1886, the year of his famous Violin Sonata in A major. The new work was written in the years 1887-88 (at the same time, 1886-88, Franck also composed his orchestral magnum opus, his sole and over time most successful Symphony in D minor). Psyché is already different from the previous works by being multi-movement and scarcely an hour long, and for long sections using a chorus consisting of soprano, alto, and tenor voices without basses. To that extent Psyché is more a departure to a kind of secular oratorio far closer to Franck's 1872-73 more developed and wonderful Poème-Symphonie 'Rédemption' (from which only the Morceau symphonique 'Rédemption' has found its way into the repertoire) than the genre of symphonic poems, from which it only inherited the name and the poetic, lyric flavor. The tripartite tone poem with chorus Psyché was premiéred on March 10, 1888 in Paris at the Société National de Musique, Salle Érard, under the direction of the composer. The next performance of the complete Psyché was given on February 23, 1890 in Paris in a Concert Colonne, conducted by Édouard Colonne (1838-1910). The three parts of the work are divided as follows: the outer, framing parts into two sections, the center part into three sections. The first part is purely orchestral, the second part uses the chorus only in the middle section, and in contrast the final part uses the chorus in both sections. Wilhelm Mohr wrote in his monograph Caesar Franck (Tutzing 1969) about Psyché: 'It is quite characteristic of Franck to use ancient themes. In his hands and with his angelic soul the pagan myths became a heavenly, compassionate love story, a drama of soul redemption. The work consists of three parts: Psyche's sleep; the gardens of Eros; and Psyche's sin, suffering, and transfiguration. Behind the highly inspired, expressive music and the somewhat mechanical text is an underlying theme of soul development which touches us: the awareness of the souls of the unconscious, the innocent, who become guilty after fulfilling their desire and by an act of grace are given a new blessedness, which differs from the blessedness of souls in the unconscious condition in that they were allowed contact with the higher realm with their cleaned and purified consciousness. [...] The chorus plays a similar role to that in a Greek drama: it does not further the plot, but instead accompanies it with commentary and warnings [Text from S. Sicard and de Foucard]. The fundamental concept for this work almost requires that it be constructed in cyclic form; one could say: if the cyclic form had not yet existed, then for this work it would have had to have been invented.' From the original Psyché, which he dedicated to his principal student and friend Vincent d'Indy (1851-1931), Franck developed the four orchestral pieces into a four-movement suite, which he subtitled Fragments pour orchestre. This orchestral version of Psyché quickly became generally accepted - in contrast to the original version with chorus - and has since been included in the repertoire of many prominent conductors and orchestras. Scores of the four movements were issued as individual publications in 1900 by the Paris publishing house of O. Bornemann, nearly one decade after Franck's death. This score is a reprint of that first edition, now for the first time in study size. Translation: Lynn Gaubatz, 2004.
Composer(s):
Publisher(s):
Publishernumber:
336
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169677
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