André Caplet: |Le Miroir de Jésus

Andre Caplet (1878-1925) is mainly known as a friend and student of Claude Debussy. Inspired by whose idea of sound he developed a musical language of his own in his short life. The composer himself conducted his central masterpiece at the debut performance in Paris on 1 May 1924. The CD at hand of the Mädchenchor Hannover (Hanover Girls Choir) under the baton of Gudrun Schröfel is the first that uses the same setting as the work’s premiere: In 1924 Caplet himself used a soloistic string quartet to accompany a girls choir. Whether Caplet chose this setting for aesthetic reasons or out of financial necessity is unclear. For the performance of a rigorously crafted score, which leaves no room for any lush or turgid sound-clouds, one can imagine that the composer would have agreed wholeheartedly to a small ensemble like the one recorded here.