Sabine Devieilhe MIRAGES

This album came about through my desire to record Lakmé, a role that has been very dear to my heart since I first performed it on stage in 2012. It’s a part of which I know and love every single bar. 

For the character of Lakmé, Léo Delibes composed some of the most beautiful music ever written for coloratura soprano. His artistic approach was essentially a French one in that he always made the voice the centre of attention, with an orchestration that is at times diaphanous (when the heroine recites a prayer) and at times dazzling (in the great love duets). It was this work that sparked my love for French nineteenth-century opera. But Lakmé also came about within the context of European artists becoming more open to influences from distant lands. Western ears were at that time keen to be taken on musical and poetic journeys, and people were increasingly receptive to perfumes from afar.

This collection explores the dream of the East cultivated by Delibes and later by Maurice Delage, who actually went on an extended visit to India and brought back with him the modal colours of Indian music. It also touches on Japan and China, as seen through the prism of Messager’s Madame Chrysanthème and Stravinsky’s Rossignol, and Egypt, with the incantation sung by La Charmeuse in Thaïs. The element of fantasy also takes on a more folk-like and popular dimension, with settings by Ambroise Thomas and Berlioz of Ophelia’s strange song. With his music for Mélisande and Ariel, both of whom use their voices to sing and to charm, Debussy uses the exoticism of the modal scale to disconcert the listener and evoke an unspecified faraway place. 

So, ‘far from the real world’, as Lakmé says before her ‘Liebestod’, like the fantasy image of a distant country – let us indulge an innocent pleasure, and dream... (Sabine Devieilhe, 2017)

Marianne Crebassa / Mozarteum Orchestra Salzburg / Marc Minkowski OH, BOY!

Marianne Crebassa has signed an exclusive recording contract with Erato. Hailed “splendidly charismatic” by The New York Times, the young French mezzo-soprano is “an absolute revelation” (Forum Opéra), praised for her “luscious voice” (Financial Times).

Within a broad repertory encompassing Handel, Gluck, Berlioz, Debussy and Offenbach, Crebassa has nonetheless made a name for herself above all in Mozart.  An alumnus of the Montpellier Conservatoire, she sang opposite Rolando Villazón in the acclaimed 2013 Lucio Silla at the Festwoche Salzburg, conducted by Marc Minkowski and reprised at the Salzburg Festival the same year. She made her La Scala debut in the same production in 2015; later that year, she portrayed Cherubino in Le nozze di Figaro at the Staatsoper Berlin, conducted by Gustavo Dudamel.

Crebassa’s first collaboration with maestro Minkowski was in a Salzburg performance of Handel’s Tamerlano in 2012, in which she sang alongside Plácido Domingo. The mezzo-soprano and conductor have continued to explore lesser-known Mozart repertoire together, most recently in a pioneering production based on his oratorio Davide penitente for the 2015 Salzburg Mozart Week, featuring equestrian choreography restoring the stage of the Salzburg Felsenreitschule (Horseriding School) to its original function.

Marc Minkowski and the Mozarteum Orchester Salzburg, then, were the ideal partners for Crebassa’s debut aria recital recording. For this project, the mezzo-soprano takes as a starting point the Mozart ‘trouser roles’ that have already won her acclaim on stage – Lucio Silla’s Cecilio (originally written for a soprano castrato) and Ramiro from La finta giardiniera and Cherubino. The theme continues with male characters from French grand operas by Chabrier, Gounod, Massenet and Offenbach.

Alain Lanceron, President of Warner Classics and Erato, said: “Since her first appearances in concert and on stage, Marianne Crebassa has captivated the international music scene, thanks to the exceptional quality of her vocal timbre and her innate musicality. We are delighted to welcome this jewel into the Erato family and look forward to a stellar future with her.”

Crebassa added: “I couldn't have hoped for greater luck than to bring my first recording to fruition with Erato. This album is close to my heart – it feels like a natural continuation of the personal and artistic connections I've made since my debut at the Salzburg Festival. This great musical city and the Mozarteum have supported me unfailingly from the beginning, as well as Marc Minkowski, with whom I have shared the stage many times. Let the adventure begin!” (IMG Artists)