Post Description

Figure humaine (1943)
Quatre motets pour le temps de noël (1952)
Salve Regina (1941)
Quatre petites prières de Saint-François d'Assise (1948)
 - door Ensemble vocal de Provence olv Helene Guy 1981

Figure humaine, cantata for 12 voices, FP 120
Francis Poulenc's cantata for double mixed a cappella choir, Figure humaine, is among his most important and highly regarded works. The eight poems that comprise the cantata are among the 29 by Paul Eluard that Poulenc would set during his career. These texts have a special significance, however: they were smuggled to Poulenc under pseudonyms. Eluard stayed underground to avoid imprisonment for his support of the French resistance. Likewise, the musical score had to be smuggled out of France for the first performance, which took place in London, on March 25, 1945. Thus, the themes of death, war, oppression and liberty that fill the pages of the work have a deeply personal resonance, for both Eluard and Poulenc, as well as for all of Nazi-occupied France. Indeed, the composer intended Figure humaine to be an anthem. I composed the work for unaccompanied choir because I wanted this act of faith to be performed without instrumental aid, by the sole means of the human voice.