Sonata for Bassoon and Piano

The French are a fiercely patriotic people—deservedly so. For several centuries their culture, intellectual figures, and modes of government were the envy of the civilized world. Of course, rivalries flared up between France and her continental neighbors, particularly Italy and Germany. During the Baroque era, French composers and performers were imported to courts and capitals all the way from Hamburg to Rome. Later Gallic composers were perhaps more influenced than influential, but through it all French music retains its delightful je ne sais quoi—that certain turn of phrase, opulent harmony, glittering texture, brilliant but subtle, that ineffable charm (call it élan) which lets one identify it as French from the start.
The luminous effect of which I speak comes through in Camille Saint-Saëns’ Sonata for Bassoon and Piano (1921). When Saint-Saëns was born in Paris in 1835, Chopin and Liszt were still young men; Brahms was just two years old. Yet he lived long enough into the 20th century to make many recordings. Already performing by age five, Saint-Saëns gave an acclaimed public debut at age ten during which he offered to play any of Beethoven’s 32 piano sonatas from memory! He later held important posts at Parisian cathedrals—notably not at the Conservatory—and numbered Gabriel Fauré among his few pupils. He was considered one of the greatest pianists and organists of the era, particularly acclaimed for his improvisations. Yet he maintained tense relations with many contemporaries. Debussy, Franck and D’Indy inspired his vehement scorn.
The Bassoon Sonata, written in the final months of his life, was composed in conjunction with similar sonatas for clarinet and oboe. Its classical aesthetic offers a reactionary stance for this late date; one might consider what Stravinsky or Bartók were composing circa 1921. Yet Saint-Saëns never felt shy about his convictions. He created this sonata partly in protest, as a direct response to how he felt Stravinsky had “abused” the bassoon in the Rite of Spring. (Saint-Saëns was in the audience at the Rite’s riotous premiere, May 29, 1913.) Hence we find the Sonata’s smooth contours eschewing all roughness; we hear long singing lines for the bassoon and clean, light, triadic accompaniment in the piano. The arrangement of tempi is novel, moving from fast to faster before pulling back for the adagio finale.

(c) Jason Stell