The Canadian contralto Marie-Nicole Lemieux, with the Orchestre Philharmonique de Monte-Carlo and its Artistic and Music Director Kazuki Yamada, interprets the now ‘traditional’ recorded pairing of two sumptuous, escapist French song cycles: Berlioz’s Les Nuits d’été and Ravel’s Shéhérazade. Complementing them both musically and thematically is a third, less frequently heard cycle by another great French composer, Camille Saint-Saëns: his Mélodies persanes (Persian Songs). ‘From the first note to the last, Lemieux’s interpretation of the Berlioz was exemplary …’ wrote Bachtrack when she performed Les Nuits d’été in Paris. ‘From the depths of her lower register to her shimmering high notes, she traced a supple trajectory through the work, phrasing with amplitude and missing no opportunity for word-painting.’

Palazzetto Bru Zane’s new edition of the Saint-Saëns cycle Mélodies persanes presented here, is a premiere recording; it gathers these orchestrations of the songs but restores the original piano-vocal order, repurposing two brief interludes from Nuit persane to serve as an orchestral introduction and transition.