Neiges d'antan

(Yesteryear snows)

Written as a direct reference to that poem from François Villon (1431-1489):

"The Ballade of the Ladies in days of yores"

Ysaÿe doesn't try here to describe every word of the poem, but he keeps that sort of nostalgic interrogation that Villon asked at the end of each stroph:

"Tell me where, in what contry

Is Flora the beautiful romain,

Archipiades or Thaïs

Who was her cousin germans ?"

And he also kept that tragic answer, under the form of an interrogation:

"But where are the yesteryears snows ?"

And then, Ysaÿe like Villon, ends also each episod by a kind of a cadence, which, as a sort,of a gust of wind, sweeps all that had been said before, leaving only place for the souvenirs

That was recorded in a concert at the 50th anniversary of Ysaÿe's death (1931-1981)

 

Piano: Christine Hartley

Violin: Jean-Claude Féret

 

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