Brilliant Fantasy

On 22 June 1846, the Belgian inventor Adolphe Sax was assigned Patent No. 3,226 by the French Patent Office for his latest invention, a whole new family of wind instruments. This was the birth of the saxophone. His aim had been to develop an instrument with a beautiful sound, even across its lower register, that would at the same time be capable of holding its own when played in the open air. The saxophone found an early advocate in the French composer Hector Berlioz, who affirmed that it was both agile in quick passages and also ideal for “delicate, religious, dreamy cantilenas”. Although initially intended primarily for use in military bands, the saxophone later found its way into jazz and became increasingly important in popular music overall. Its rising popularity was a result of several different factors. Early recording methods, both mechanical and electromechanical, proved able to capture its sound adequately. It also became a feature of early sound films and of the visual arts – see, for example, Otto Dix’s triptych Grossstadt (“Metropolis”) – and its graceful form enabled it to become nothing less than an icon of modernity. In the world of classical music, however, the saxophone long remained something of a marginal phenomenon.

The saxophone is taking centre-stage in the Swiss Orchestra’s concert with the French saxophonist Valentine Michaud. This instrument’s versatile, expressive sound can range from gentle and dreamy to brash and penetrating, from melancholic and plaintive to passionate or playful. This in turn enables it to evoke all manner of associations and inner images, whether it’s a big city at night or intimate, personal moments. So it’s only fitting that our New Year’s Concert is entitled “Brilliant Fantasy”. Alongside Alexander Glazunov’s Saxophone Concerto, our programme features François Borne’s virtuosic Fantaisie Brillante, a fantasy on well-known themes from Georges Bizet’s opera Carmen. We offer two string serenades – one by the Swiss Joseph Lauber, the other by the Czech Antonín Dvořák – and two classic, New-Year staples by Johann Strauss, father and son. And to begin, there’s Frank Martin’s Pavane couleur du temps (“Pavan for the colour of time”), which is based on Charles Perrault’s fairytale “Peau d’âne” (“Donkey skin”) in which a princess seeks to evade getting married by demanding a dress in the colour of the sky.