The Beatitudes as a monumental work

Today, César Franck is mainly regarded as the father of French Romantic organ symphonies and the inspiration for his pupils Widor, Vierne, Tournemire and Debussy. His organ works and the Symphony in D minor in particular are still very popular today. However, his operas, songs, masses and oratorios tend to lead a shadowy existence. It is therefore all the more commendable that Carus-Verlag Stuttgart has published his main choral symphonic work, written in 1879, in time for the 200th anniversary of the composer's birth. Les Béatitudes published for the first time in a scholarly Urtext edition.

The monumental, two-hour work in French sets the Beatitudes from Jesus' Sermon on the Mount, can be classified as something between a sacred opera and an oratorio and impresses with its contrasting alternation of folk song-like, lyrical, dramatic and hymn-like episodes. Some movements were composed as early as 1870 during the siege of Paris in the Franco-Prussian War. After a prologue, the words of Christ "Blessed are ..." are preceded in each of the eight movements by earthly or heavenly choruses in an antithetical and commentary style.

The orchestral scoring is opulent in a contemporary French style and requires a choir with good numbers and voices. Despite the eight solo parts, some of which can be reduced by a clever division of roles as suggested in the preface, the choral part is quite large and not too heavy. A rewarding and worthwhile work for oratorio choirs.

César Franck: Les Béatitudes op. 25, oratorio for soloists, choir and orchestra, edited by Hans Christoph Becker-Foss and Thomas Ohlendorf; score CV 10.393/00, € 119.00; piano reduction CV 10.393/30, € 29.95; Carus, Stuttgart