Saint-Saëns – Symphony No.3 “Organ”
Vincent Warnier; Orchestre National de Lyon; Leonard Slatkin
Naxos 8.573331
This disc is recommended for any collection lacking the Saint-Saëns Organ Symphony (1886). Organist Vincent Warnier and conductor Leonard Slatkin give a colourful reading, creating a coherent whole from diversity. In the opening movement strings and winds complement each other. The Lyon winds in particular are superb, both as soloists and as a wind choir, playing everything from busy double-note figures to the chorale theme. Saint-Saëns held off introducing the organ until after the sublime transition at the close of the first movement. This passage is paced and balanced expertly by Slatkin, and the following Poco adagio with its beautiful romantic harmony is alone worth the disc’s price. The organ becomes a new force, connecting well to wind and brass timbres while supporting the strings’ melodic voice. The scherzo’s tricky ensemble and the lightning-fast trio with its piano flourishes are handled impeccably. A foursquare and populist finale that incorporates brilliant brass and organ, ingenious development of the chorale theme and the Dies irae and much besides, ought not to work but on this recording it does!
The Lyon Auditorium organ on this recording is a refurbished transplant from Paris of the Cavaillé-Coll instrument on which Cyprès et Lauriers (1919) was premiered. Warnier is sensitive to the composer`s late exploratory chromaticism in the solo organ lament Cyprès, and appropriately celebratory in Lauriers for organ and orchestra. An ingenious transcription of Saint-Saëns’s well-known Danse macabre completes the disc.
