Our four Konzerthausorchester string players take you on a voyage deep into the French fin de siècle. They are joined on their Sunday morning expedition into this seductive sunken world by soprano Letitia Grimaldi Spitzer as well as pianists Annika Treutler and Zhora Sargsyan.

Ernest Chausson’s “Chanson perpétuelle”, the “Perpetual Song”, lets the singer mourn a failed love affair in a highly beautiful bel canto, dramatically seconded by strings and piano. The talented young Belgian Guillaume Lekeu wrote his cantata “Andromède” when he was just 21, but the Franck pupil died of typhoid fever at the tender age of 24. For his part, Camille Saint-Saëns (1835-1921) was granted a long life full of musical success, during which he wrote not only three concertos but also a dozen other works for violin, of which the First Sonata can be heard here. From the summer of 1878, César Franck spent nearly a year writing his monumentally symphonic Piano Quintet, which would not be adequately appreciated until well into the 20th century. In his day, even the dedicatee Saint-Saëns, who sat at the piano during the premiere, showed little loyalty to the piece or to his friend.