Bizet - L'Arlésienne (1991)/ Gounod - Petite Symphonie & Symphony No.1

Op 22 mei 2013 speelt het Nederlands Symfonie Orkest de hier vastgelegde Petite symphonie pour instruments à vent. Gramophone over deze CD: "Gounod's First symphony reveals little or nothing specifically Gallic or personal and would puzzle any first-time listener, trying to identify its composer. But its idiom surely stems from the composer's early friendship with Mendelssohn's sister Fanny Hensel, who introduced him to her brother's music as well as that of Bach and Beethoven. This civilized and elegantly mannered music is given with grace by Christopher Hogwood and his orchestra. The Petite symphonie is delightfully done by nine expert players. It's a later piece and a more original one in that it uses only wind instruments and is really a chamber work. It shows that the composer's dictum that 'France is essentially the country of precision, neatness and taste' was entirely true for his kind of Frenchness. The performance of a selection of numbers from L'Arlesienne is committed and compelling."