OUR Recordings is proud to announce the release of the great choir music by Francis Poulenc, which is standard repertoire for all professional choirs. On this release, Stephen Layton and the Danish National Vocal Ensemble, put together a program representing both Poulenc`s secular and sacred choral music.

Poulenc was a man of contradictions. The traditionalists called him a modernist, the modernists called him old-fashioned. The contradictions were almost glaring: a declared homosexual and devout Catholic in the first half of the twentieth century! Courageous? Indeed!

He wrote modern music but couldn’t help creating melodies. That was to be both his good fortune and his misfortune. He knew so much about instruments and voices, and his music sounded so good that it could be regarded as poppish, and many people were loath to admit him to the serious musical world of Europe. Some snobs spoke of “French elegance”, “Gallic esprit” or – even worse – “perfumed music”, and this was not meant as praise.

Poulenc died in 1963. The rascal was there until the end: “Even though you may think the music is in bad taste, you must play your heart out all the same. I am quite aware of what I can do. And pianists must remember that you can never use too much pedal!”.