Search - José van Dam, Henri Duparc, Maciej Pikulski :: Duparc: Les MÃ?©lodies

Another triumph for Jose Van Dam

W. N. Hay | Princeton, NJ United States | 05/11/2003

(5 out of 5 stars)

"Henri Duparc is one of the great composers of the French melodie. However he composed for a very short time because he was dealing with a great deal of depression. He is one of many composers who dealt with that in their lives. Duparc composed in the late ninteenth century. Although he lived into the twentieth century, he stopped composing before then. The songs represented on this CD are all of the songs that Duparc wrote. Duparc was greatly influenced by Richard Wagner. Therefore these songs can be Wagnerian or they can have a great deal tenderness in them. That is why Jose Van Dam's voice fits these songs so well.
L'invitation au voyage is the first selection on this CD. The poem is by Charles Baudlaire. This song sits very high for a bass-baritone. Mr. Van Dam makes it sound easy vocally and textually. Mr. Van Dam's French can serve as a model for those who want to sing in the language. La Vague et la cloche is sung with great declamation and vocal size. The color change from Jose Van Dam from the previous two songs on the CD is quite amazing. The change from dolce or sweet singing to pleine voce or full voiced singing. This song is very heavy in the vocal line and the accompaniment. Extase is a song that grabs the listener because of the great beauty of it. Mr. Van Dam floats a soft high F that could not be more gorgeous in tone. The color change from La Vague et la cloche to Extase shows Mr. Van Dam's great ability to change the color of his voice. That ability is important because it really keeps the listener interested. Le Manoir de Rosamonde is a fantastic song because of the character of the music. That character is rage because of betrayal. Mr. Van Dam's voice is huge in this song. Sometimes he can just roar. He certainly does that here. Lamento shows the listener Mr. Van Dam's great breath control. This song requires the ability to sustain soft notes for a long time. His soft singing in this song gives me a chill when I listen to it. Testament is another heavy song vocally. Mr. Van Dam sings up to a ringing high G flat at the climax of the song with great ease. Whoever compiled this CD was very smart to put Chanson Triste after Testament. The color of these two songs are very different. Chanson Triste has a much lighter texture then Testament. Mr. Van Dam takes this song in the medium key and sings a high F sharp with great beauty of tone. It is amazing how good his high notes are for a bass-baritone. La Vie anterieure is a magnificent song which is extremely difficult to sing. This song requires nearly two octaves of range, and it requires big singing. Mr. Van Dam does all of this at a slow tempo. This slower tempo makes Mr. Van Dam's recording of this song all the more impressive. The high notes in this song are absolutely gorgeous tones. Le Gallop is a song specifically written for baritone which is also extremely difficult to sing and extremely difficult textually. This song cannot be attempted by a small voice because the character of the music calls for a big sound. Mr. Van Dam provides this sound and sings this song with great excitment. The piano part is especially interesting in this song. It represents the galloping to great effect.
For those who do not know Duparc's songs I could not recommend a better recording of them. The artistic abilities of Jose Van Dam really sell the songs to the listeners. He sings with a great deal of sincerity which is important for these songs. The texts of these songs are often so sad. Finally Mr. Van Dam's handling of the French language is so good that one could almost take dictation from it. This CD is a must buy for listening pleasure and for learning."