Dinu Lipatti – Five Songs on poems by Paul Verlaine, for tenor and piano, op. 9

Dinu Lipatti – Five Songs on poems by Paul Verlaine, for tenor and piano, op. 9 – B.41

PREFACE

Dinu Lipatti - A life dedicated to music

Dinu Lipatti was born in Bucharest on March 19, 1917, a tumultuous moment when Romania was under German occupation during World War 1. He was a source of peace and hope for the family during this turbulent time and was showered with great affection. Dinu grew up in an artistic environment for his parents were skilled amateur musicians themselves – his father played the violin and his mother played the piano. This allowed him to develop his exceptional musical skills from a very young age. Upon recognizing his talent, they decided that he should study music. At the age of eight, little Dinu was entrusted to Mihail Jora, who was, at that time an important figure in the Romanian music world, to begin a serious and methodical musical education.

After three years of studying piano, solfege, and harmony, Dinu has already reached the required level for entering the Academy of Music and Dramatic Arts in Bucharest where he started working with the famous piano teacher, Florica Musicescu. The lessons with Mihail Jora continued but were focused on composition instead. Lipatti’s progress was rapid and he graduated with the highest honors in 1932, after only four years. At the Academy gala concert for his graduation, he performed Chopin’s Concerto in E minor. Dinu’s career as a concert pianist would commence the following year with Liszt’s E-flat major Concerto, accompanied by the Bucharest Philharmonic Orchestra with conductor Alfred Alessandrescu.

That the same year, 1933, the 16-year-old Lipatti took part in the Vienna International Piano Competition where he received the second prize. It was here that he met his future piano teacher, Alfred Cortot (himself a member of the jury), who claimed that the talented Romanian pianist clearly deserved the first prize. In the meantime, the young musician continued to develop as a composer and proceeded to win three successive awards at the „George Enescu” Competition for Composition: first mention (the Romanian equivalent to the fourth prize) with the Sonata for piano solo in 1932, second prize with the Sonatina for violin and piano in 1933, and the first prize with his Symphonic suite „Les Tziganes” in 1934. This latter award established the artist as a promising composer.

1934 marked the beginning of a new phase in the life of Lipatti when he moved to Paris with his mother and younger brother. It was then that his piano studies with Alfred Cortot and his assistant Yvonne Lefébure started at the Ecole Normale de Musique. He also enrolled in composition classes studying under Paul Dukas. His teachers soon realized that their newly arrived student was not like the average freshman, but rather a fully formed artist, who should be supported in the recognition of his diverse qualities. The exceptional praise the teenager received was a positive statement for the Romanian musical school which produced many important artists (one of them being George Enescu), who made their mark in both performance and composition. Without diminishing the value of the influences received by Lipatti in France where he had the chance to come in contact with great artists of tat time, one has to observe that the core of his piano and composition skills were acquired during his studies in Romania. In the ample exchange of letters with his Romanian teachers we can follow his artistic development and the rich artistic ambiance surrounding him. After the death of Paul Dukas, Lipatti continued his composition studies with Nadia Boulanger. This encounter had a huge impact on his development, brought him to the discovery of his true artistic potential and propelled him to the attention of the great artists of that time.

During the study period, Lipatti worked with enthusiasm and modesty, even when Cortot portrayed him as a second Horowitz. According to his own statement, his piano playing gained more ‘colour’. His career continued successfully with concerts in France and Switzerland and he made his first recordings at the Ecole Normale de Musique. His piano repertoire grew and diversified continually while he also showed interest for orchestral conducting for which he attended the classes of Diran Alexanian and Charles Münch. By this time, he composed his well-known Concertino in Classical Style for piano and orchestra and his Simfonia Concertante for two pianos and string orchestra. Although both of them are mature works, one can see that he was still looking for his means of expression while being influenced by his teachers and by the modern music of that time, especially by Stravinsky. Lipatti integrated well in the Parisian artistic life and was often invited to private functions of the musical inner circle. He wrote a series of reviews for the Libertatea newspaper in Bucharest between 1938 – 1939 which showed a keen capacity of observation, maturity and honesty.

In 1939, after five years in Paris, Lipatti returned to Romania. Having obtained his concert license in France at the end of his studies, his teachers became colleagues and distinguished friends. In Romania, he imposed himself in the music life through several concert tours with the Bucharest Philharmonic Orchestra and a prestigious artistic collaboration that brought him closer to his godfather, George Enescu. The young disciple takes on his master’s advices, studies his works and accompanies him in chamber music recitals. The maturity of his works is ever more visible, among others in his original and much appreciated Concerto for piano and organ, Piano fantasy, Piano sonata for the left hand or the „Romanian dances” for two pianos. In an effort to avoid Enescu’s magnetic influences, Lipatti tries to seek his own style, which in the end can be summed up as a synthesis between native inspiration and contemporary composition processes.
However, Lipatti the pianist was quickly surpassing Lipatti the composer. The recordings of this period remained as precious testimonies of his playing before leaving Romania for good: some pieces by J.S. Bach, Scarlatti, Chopin, Liszt, Brahms, just to name a few, and Enescu’s second and third sonatas for violin and piano performed with the composer himself and Lipatti’s own Concertino in classical style.

At the beginning of September 1943, Dinu Lipatti, together with his fiancée, the pianist Madeleine Cantacuzino, left for his last grand concert tour. After passing through Vienna, Stockholm, Helsinki, Göteborg, Malmö, Zurich, Geneva and Bern the plan was to return to Bucharest in mid-October. In spite of the countless obstacles caused by the war, the tour succeeded with the exception of the return to Bucharest. Destiny chose another path. In October 1943, the young couple decided to settle in Geneva. Albeit the difficulties faced by them, they were warmly welcomed. A group of sincere friends and their families surrounded the newly arrived with sympathy and admiration and helped them in these hard times: Ernest Ansermet, Frank Martin, Igor Markevitch, Nikita Magaloff, Hugues Cuénod, Paul Sacher and other Swiss or foreign artists.

Shortly after the first concerts in Geneva, Henri Gagnebin, director of the Conservatory, offers the young pianist a professorship position. For five years Lipatti taught enthusiastically the advanced and virtuosity classes. Without meaning to impose but rather to suggest and propose, he quickly become an idol for his students.

But when his life situation becomes safer and his reputation as a pianist and a teacher was evidently blooming, the signs of a worryingly mysterious disease begin to appear: fever, painful ganglia and fatigue. The young pianist has to cancel concerts, he was homebound for weeks at a time and was forced to make temporary retreats in the mountains. In moments of respite, he boldly resumed his tours, despite medical interdictions and enthusiastically played in the smallest cities where he was met with great lovingness. He was increasingly being requested to perform in Europe, the United States, South America and Australia. Unfortunately, he would never be able to leave the continent.

In London, Lipatti was requested by Columbia Records and its artistic director Walter Legge to start a series of recordings. At around the same time, he had completed a successful tour in the Netherlands and as a result was offered a home by the Dutch in their country and in addition, was sent a special wagon for the voyage. Other remarkable accomplishments followed in Switzerland and France where praiseworthy chronicles abound. The French journalist Pierre Guiton, for example, titled his review: „I have listened to Frederic Chopin performing his Sonata in B minor!”.

In Geneva, a group of friends presented him a superb Steinway concert piano. To the already mentioned friends and collaborators there still is a number of names to add: Clara Haskil, with whom he was connected by a deep artistic friendship and a long exchange of letters which already started during his studies in France, Edwin Fischer, Wilhelm Backhaus, Antonio Janigro, Herbert von Karajan, Paul Hindemith, Charles Münch, Yehudi Menuhin, Arthur Schnabel, Walter Gieseking, André Marescotti, without forgetting his much adored teacher Nadia Boulanger and Dr. Henri Dubois-Ferrière, the founder of the foundation created in 1970 to fight against blood-borne diseases, which has its name associated with that of Lipatti.

As his health deteriorates, the Conservatory offered him the help of an assistant, Louis Hiltbrand – a young and admirable teacher – which Lipatti accepted wholeheartedly. Later, in 1949, Lipatti decided to give up teaching. The Conservatory Bulletin announces with great regret the resignation of „this eminent professor and artist, among the greatest of our time”.
However, he continued to performed in concerts. And no one, except for his wife or his very close friends, realized the struggle that takes place in front of the audience as they were entirely mesmerized by the artistic perfection and the human presence of Lipatti.

Between crises, transfusions and the exhausting X-ray treatment, he worked and changed his technique in function of the new difficulties caused by the inflamed lymph nodes. His left arm became thicker and every movement was painful. Dinu Lipatti now found out that he was suffering from malignant lymphogranulomatosis (Hodgkin disease) and he was also aware of the minimal chance of recovery. However, he is not discouraged. He kept his humor and encouraged his family in Romania. If he can’t play, he would compose, even if he was bedridden. After the Four Melodies for voice and piano on the lyrics of French poets and the transcription of the „Romanian Dances” for piano and orchestra, he completed his work on his last composition „Aubade” for woodwind quartet.

At this time, Dinu Lipatti’s repertoire numbered sixteen concerts – from Bach to Bartók – and six different recital programs. But in actual fact, his repertoire was much larger. Lipatti had reached an amazing knowledge of the piano literature, although his ideal of perfection was so high that only a small part was considered assimilated. If he would have gone with a simplistic approach to music, so common nowadays, he could at all times have played Bach’s complete preludes and fugues, Chopin’s mazurkas and etudes, as well as the etudes of Debussy, and even Beethoven’s sonatas, which, according to his students, he could instantly transpose in any tonality.
In 1950, after some months of treatment and a long stay in the mountains of Montana, Switzerland, he is exhausted but relatively recovered. He finally returned to Geneva, where he was able to play again Schumann’s Piano Concerto in the Victoria Hall, together with Ansermet and the Suisse Romande Orchestra. The press and the public react with indescribable enthusiasm in Geneva, as well as in Zürich where he played Chopin’s E minor Concerto, and at his recital in Berna.

The summer of that year brought great hope: cortisone had just been discovered and Lipatti miraculously regained his strength. At the advice of doctor Dubois-Ferrière, Walter Legge hurried to Geneva with a Colombia Records coach full of technicians to make the long-delayed piano recordings. Between July 2 and July 12, Lipatti imprinted most of his artistic legacy on disc with extraordinary enthusiasm and incredible force: Bach, Mozart, Chopin. Referring to the impressive testimonies of Walter Legge, it seems that he was very happy during this effortful task.

Among the works recorded at this time, the most touching was Jesus bleibet meine Freude by J.S. Bach, Lipatti’s favorite encore piece, a work which marked his existence, following him everywhere like a leitmotif. It is known that the pianist had tried out a lot of versions before settling to the publication of the last version.

In the middle of the small park at Chêne-Bourg, at the edge of Geneva – currently the „Dinu Lipatti Park” Quarter –, in a villa provided by his friends, Dinu steadily continued his activity in a focused manner, in view of his new commitments, although his apparent vitality was beginning to fade. On August 23, he performed Mozart’s Piano Concerto in C major, KV 467, at the Lucerne music festival together with Karajan and the festival’s orchestra. This was followed by the legendary Besançon recital, which almost didn’t happen – on the afternoon of September 16, down with fever, Lipatti did not think that he will be able to play. Finally, encouraged by his doctor, he decided to push himself for the great effort. The recital, which he managed to play in its entirety, remains a testament to his great will and dedication. „Do not use music, serve it!” was Lipatti’s motto. The great artist served music for the last time. Two months later, on December 2, 1950, Lipatti left this world.

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In Romania and abroad, Dinu Lipatti’s name comes next to those of George Enescu, Constantin Brâncuși, Mircea Eliade and many great others. All over the world, even on the continents he could not travel to in his short life, the Romanian artist was considered one of the greatest performers of the first half of the 20th century. After his death, just when the LP disc technology was being discovered, his fame grew continuously with the help of the new 33 and 45 rpm records. Starting with the last decade of the century, his complete recordings have been transferred to ‘compact disc digital audio’ – the CD.

Dinu Lipatti’s renown has lasted due to his exceptional artistic and human qualities, gained through continuous, methodical and hard work. The pianist had brilliantly anticipated the evolution of piano technique and that of the performative art. His principles, which were succinctly outlined in his exchange of letters, in interviews and during his classes at the Geneva Conservatory, are true and still valid to this day. As a composer, he seemed to have followed in the footsteps of Enescu, brilliantly combining Romania’s folklore with the strong and diverse modern techniques of the day. The legend and luminous aura of Dinu Lipatti’s personality remain ever-present in both Romanian and universal music.

Grigore Bărgăuanu
Translation: Lucian Beschiu

Five Songs
on poems by Paul Verlaine, for tenor and piano
op. 9 – B.41

One of the most important names in the modern era of piano performance, Dinu Lipatti owes his complex musical education as a composer to his teachers: Mihail Jora, Paul Dukas and Nadia Boulanger. His particular style brings together a mix of Romanian folklore elements, post-impressionist, neoclassical and neo-baroque echoes in a modern fusion, synchronized with the paths of his contemporaries. His music is sensitive, serene and unmistakable.

Five songs on poems by Paul Verlaine, op. 9, are part of a rich thesaurus of Romanian songs written on French verses, a statement about „the most beautiful cultural colonization of a country, in the absence of a conqueror” (quoting the Romanian historian, Neagu Djuvara).
A une femme (To a Woman) is a tender but tenacious cry of giving oneself to complete love, through art. The sovereign voice of the soprano is accompanied by an imperturbable ternary movement at the piano, making its way to infinity in a Bachian manner. Among the vocal high points, we have to distinguish as a climax between bars 61-69, powerfully sustained by the piano, which also corresponds to the golden ratio of the whole piece.

Green, a bucolic piece (as the English title suggests) presents a deliberately naïve vocal line, joined by a joyful piano accompaniment, which does not shy away from modern dissonances, finely placed in order to enrich the colorfulness of the piece.

Deux Ariettes oubliées (Two forgotten Ariettas) present a tandem which is dear to Romanian folk music: Doină (a sorrowful song) / Joc (a folk dance), where the first piece is slow moving and tense (Il pleure dans mon Coeur / It rains in my heart), and the second (Le piano que baise une main frêle / The piano that kisses a frail hand), a dance combining ternary and binary sections. The musical language of the first song is in direct connection with Enescu’s unique folk-inspired musical language from his Doina for baritone, viola and violoncello, Les voix de la steppe and Carillon Nocturne from the 3rd Piano Suite, as well as from the 3rd Sonata for Violin and Piano, dans le caractère populaire roumain (in Romanian Folk Style). Paul Verlaine should be content with Lipatti’s setting where nature’s and the soul’s melancholic rain translates into dor – a untranslatable Romanian feeling of longing. The second piece presents an alternance between a burlesque binary movement and an elegant Sicilian ternary.

Sérénade (Serenade) closes off the almost cyclical succession of these songs by recalling the playful atmosphere of the previous song, the restlessness of A unne femme, the light from Green, surpassing them all in brilliant piano gestures – which then wander towards whispers of the voice –, in daring somersaults, versatile trajectories and colors. The comparison between the loved woman and an angel, as well as with a scholar guillotined during the French Revolution (Mon ange! – ma Gouge!) can offer some emotional coordinates - the sound structures juggle, making the player and the singer a part of an unleashing palpable and alive kaleidoscope of vibrations.

Camelia Pavlenco
Translation: Lucian Beschiu

Four Melodies
for voice and piano
WoO. – B. 42

Dinu Lipatti’s compositions represent an unknown territory in Romania’s music history, insufficiently explored in the music life around the world. Although most of his time was dedicated to playing piano (sometimes with regret for not being able to compose more), he still gave us a few remarkable piano, vocal and orchestral works. His studies in Bucharest with Mihail Jora and in Paris with Paul Dukas and Nadia Boulanger led to a unique personal style, consisting of a fine combination between late impressionism, Romanian folk elements, and a strong neoclassical (sometimes neo-baroque) influence, in tune with the modern European aesthetics.

The Four melodies for voice (tenor) and piano, WoO. - B. 43, were composed in Mérimont (Switzerland) in June 1945, on poems by Arthur Rimbaud, Paul Eluard and Paul Valéry. The Romanian translation was especially made for singing by Nina Cassian (herself a pianist and composer) and Vlaicu Barna.

Sensation (Sensation) – dedicated to Lipatti’s mother –, on the lyrics of the rebel Arthur Rimbaud, is a refined and concise jewel, in which the voice, chanting the French verse with humble nobility, is embedded in the piano texture as a human pulse overwhelmed by emotions. The piano’s ostentatious rhythmic figure provides a dense landscape, over which melodic trajectories and well-chosen colored harmonies blend, according to the fantasy of the two performers.
L’amoureuse (The Lover) – dedicated to his wife Madeleine –, on the lyrics of the modern Paul Eluard, gives the singer a promise of freedom to achieve peaks of vocal and emotional fullness. This is accompanied by the piano’s continuous ternary movement, modestly interrupted only by the vocal climax.

La capitale de la douleur (The Fortress of Pain) – dedicated to Maria Sarasin –, also on the lyrics of his contemporary Paul Eluard, brings about a discrete canzonetta climate, a tender provincial waltz movement, in which the piano gives up the severity of ostentatious figures, amorously entwining the vocal motifs, growing with them, or humbly accompanying the youthful and bodacious voice.
The last song, Les Pas (The Steps) – dedicated to the marquise Germaine de Narros –, on the verses of the „lyrical architect” Paul Valery, ends the cycle with subtle recollections: the piano’s ostinato figures as in the first songs, the voice chants, again from the first song, enriched by the exalted character of the other two pieces. The piano presents a ‘Bach choral’ texture, slightly distorted by the reflection of a modern mirror, while the voice, dedicating itself totally, sings with a romantic declamatory determination.

The first audition of these pieces in Mérimont, were sung by the tenor Hugues Cuénod, accompanied by the composer. After his death, they were resumed in Brussels, where Madeleine Lipatti played the piano. In 1969 they were recorded at Radio Lausanne and later at Electrecord by Valentin Theodorian and Lisette Georgescu at the piano - who also edited the first edition of these significant vocal miniatures in Lipatti’s works.

Camelia Pavlenco
Translation: Lucian Beschiu