LDV102

29 XAVIER PHILLIPS, CÉDRIC TIBERGHIEN Another quotation from Vladimir Jankélévitch: ‘The oeuvre of Fauré is an eternal departure and an infinite return.’ What do you think of that remark? Xavier Phillips: I think it’s apt, and very beautiful. Fauré’s music is like water. It’s in a perpetual loop, constantly flowing, like a stream that flows into a river, which itself flows into the sea, where rainclouds form, and so on . . . Its course is sometimes tumultuous, sometimes serene. His music is astonishing in its vitality. It works according to the principle of arborescence. For me the most striking example is the last movement of the Sonata no.1: Fauré marks an extremely slow tempo. We experimented with getting as close to his metronome mark as possible while still ensuring the music would move forward and remain fluid. We gradually lowered the tempo, just as you lower your heart rate. That allowed us to understand how his music unfolds – calmly, slowly, and then all at once it bursts into flame, ending in a surge of passion. Cédric Tiberghien: This vitality is heightened still further in his two sonatas, written at over seventy years of age! They’re placid at the start, the tempo gradually gets faster, then suddenly you reach incandescence. That fire was already crackling in earlier pieces of his, like the First Violin Sonata and the First Piano Quartet. There’s a dichotomy between the elderly gentleman with the moustache we see in the photographs and his inner self, between his appearance and what the pictures don’t show.