Composers P

During the 1920s, Poulenc was at the forefront of a collection of young composers known as ‘Les Six’, whose music was ironic, witty and urbane, and influenced equally by jazz, Erik Satie and Neo-Classicism – a conscious reaction against the cerebralism of Schoenberg and Messiaen. Of his own work, he said: “I know perfectly well that I am not one of those composers to have made harmonic innovations… But I think there’s room for ‘new’ music which doesn’t mind using other people’s chords! Wasn’t that the case for Mozart and Schubert?”.

 

The Sextet certainly looks back to the fast-slow-fast models of the classical chamber sonata – but with quirky ‘modernist’ touches, like the very opening, sounding like a hefty sneeze. Also, whereas in the Mozartian model, the piano would have accompanied the winds, here it takes the lead for much of the piece – setting the tone, instigating harmonic shifts, and changing the subject. The Sextet goes in for a good deal of manic, surreal, scampering-around – except the oboe, who resolutely remains the voice of sanity amidst the hubbub. The first movement is, within itself, a fast-slow-fast structure, and the second movement progresses slow-fast-slow. The finale is a Classical rondo at lightning pace, referencing the opening movement as it plays out. Poulenc ends by taking a leaf out of Stravinsky’s book, leading us convincingly from harmonically adventurous jazz dance styles to a solemn transfiguration in unadulterated C major at the very close.