The Music of LUCIEN CAILLIET (1936-46) - PASC444

Long-lived French-American Lucien Cailliet (1891–1985) is undoubtedly best known and remembered in the band world, since his transcriptions of Wagner’s “Elsa’s Procession” from Lohengrin and the Finlandia of Sibelius have long been staples in that realm. In 1919, Leopold Stokowski brought him into the Philadelphia Orchestra as clarinetist, and soon became aware of his skills at orchestration. There is some debate, in fact, as to how much of Stokowski’s own arrangements are actually the work of Cailliet. About a year after Eugene Ormandy came into Philadelphia in 1936 as co-conductor of the orchestra, he hired Cailliet (who was then leaving to assume another position) to make an arrangement of Mussorgsky’s Pictures at an Exhibition, as he had by then become Ormandy’s arranger of choice as well. Ormandy could not have failed to notice the success of the Koussevitzky-commissioned Ravel orchestration of Pictures, and thus desired to have his own version of the piece. This was not because of contractual reasons between Koussevitzky and Ravel, for the Russian conductor was given only, if memory serves, five years of exclusivity in his 1922 commission from the French master. I would therefore guess that professional jealousy played a big part in Ormandy’s commission, which was premiered on February 5, 1937.

As one might imagine, the intricate dance that Stokowski and Ormandy were engaged in during the transitional years of 1936 to 1941 (at which time, Ormandy took over as exclusive music director of the Philadelphia Orchestra) may well have contributed to Stokowski’s desire to make his own version of Pictures. Ostensibly, he was competing with Ravel, claiming that Ravel’s version was too “French,” but I strongly suspect that he thought that he could also do a superior job in orchestrating the work from what Cailliet had done and perhaps gain bragging rights over Ormandy. Regardless of his motive, Stokowski’s 1939 version has run a very distant second to Ravel’s in terms of performances and recordings, but it is nevertheless ahead of every other orchestration in that regard. Caillet’s effort, on the other hand, is somewhere near the back of the pack. I’ve never found evidence that any other conductor than Ormandy ever even performed the version (a very partial exception is the “Ballet of Unhatched Chicks” movement that Leonard Slatkin has used in one of his compilations), and although the score and parts are reputed to reside in the library of the Philadelphia Orchestra, they are said to be in questionable performing condition.

Has history adjudged Cailliet’s version fairly? Generally, I think yes: Just listen to the wimpy woodwind opening of the work, the rather unimaginative accompaniment to the solo English horn in “Il vecchio Castello,” or the too cumbersome version of “Tuilleries.” Still, there are some worthwhile moments in this version, including the snarling brass in “Gnomus,” the melancholy solo cello at the end of “Samuel Goldenberg,” the orchestration of the Fifth Promenade (omitted by Ravel), or the use of unison horns and trombones at the beginning of “Bydło” in place of Ravel’s overly tame tenor tuba, which cannot adequately portray straining oxen (I do find Ormandy’s tempo in this movement inexcusably fast, however). In any case, this transcription is worth hearing, if nothing else, as a historical artifact (and why can we not also have a recording of the early [1924] version by Leonidus Leonardi?)

What of Cailliet’s other orchestrations? The Bach selections are rich and opulent, in keeping with the era of sonorous orchestration that existed in the 1930s (I would guess that the famous—notorious to some—Beecham orchestration of Handel’s Messiah also comes from around the same time). There is no question, in any case, of the visceral excitement that is imparted to Bach’s majestic Prelude and Fugue in F Minor. Only orchestrators of this era, of course, would have added a prominent harp part to “Jesu, Joy of Man’s Desiring,” and Cailliet had to fill in implied harmonies in the Preludium from the E-Major Partita, originally for solo violin. Purcell also gets the lush treatment (slightly less than that encountered in the Bach selections), but these movements from Dido and Aeneas are still fun to listen to.

With the Turina’s “Sacro-monte,” we come to a much less anachronistic orchestration. Turina was Cailliet’s near contemporary, although he lived only about half as long. This brief selection, one of his Cinco Danzas Gitanos, was originally for solo piano, and the light-hearted and jolly character piece sounds quite convincing as an orchestration that Turina himself might have done. The CD concludes with Cailliet’s original work, Variations on the Theme Pop Goes the Weasel, a brief bit of jollity that has gained quite a few performances in both the orchestral and band worlds.

Producer Mark Obert-Thorn has done his usual exemplary work in the transfers, which provide life-like presence and clarity of texture, producing sound that is about as good as one can hear in recordings from this era. The Mussorgsky portion of this CD was previously issued on a Biddulph CD (also with transfers by Obert-Thorn), and I cannot hear any difference between the sound of that CD and the present one. I also A-B’d the Pictures with my original Victor 78 set, and found that his transfers were true to the original, while virtually eliminating the surface noise. This release constitutes an important historical document, and is worth acquiring on that basis alone. The musical enjoyment it also affords is icing on the cake. I do wish, though, that he’d utilized both sides of the leaflet so as not to require a virtually illegible (six point?) type size to get the notes onto a single page.

David DeBoor Canfield
This article originally appeared in Issue 39:2 (Nov/Dec 2015) of Fanfare Magazine.