ROMANTIC!

CONVERSATIONS AROUND A HARP WITH CLAIRE

GALO-PLACE, IN THE MUSIC ROOM AT LA BELLE
JULIETTE

92 rue du
Cherche-Midi
75006 paris 

Tickets:
18 euros
——

Reservation :
reservation@
labellejuliette.com
&
01 42 22 97 40

6pm SUNDAY 15TH MAY 2011

We would be delighted to offer you a glass of

champagne after the conversation
 CLAIRE GALO-PLACE

NE PAS JETER SUR LA VOIE PUBLIQUE — L’ABUS D’ALCOOL EST DANGEREUX

Claire Galo-Place obtained a masters degree in solo harp from the prestigious
Bloomington University (U.S.A.) and was an award winner in the 2003
international competition in Soka (JapAn). Continuing her career as a solist
and chamber music player, she recently founded the Jean Cras instrumental
ensemble and a non-profit group of the same name.

Romantic !
Fantasy in C minor by Louis Spohr, The mandolin by Elias Parish-Alvars, Un sospiro,
caprice poétique by Franz Liszt, Introduction and variations on the theme of Bellini’s
Norma by Elias Parish-Alvars, The Venice Carnival by Félix Godefroid
Romantic? Musically, what does that evoke for you? The harp, of course. It’s
absolutely true that this instrument had its heyday during the romantic period,
mostly thanks to the technical improvements that turned a minor instrument in
something masterful that could play unaccompanied and speak the impassioned
language of its time.
Better still, people would for the first time hear pieces that were unplayable on other
instruments: a typically “harpist” language has been created, mainly thanks to player-
composers such as Elias Parish-Alvars and Félix Godefroid.
For example, the Mandolin taunts pianists with trills that would be impossible
to reproduce on a piano. The new possibilities opened up by the instrument are
also explored in pieces like “Introduction and variations on the theme of Bellini’s
Norma” and “The Venice Carnival” that a fresh, Spring-like theme and expand it with
increasingly masterful variations.
Spohr’s “Fantasy in C minor” from 1805 is a good example of early romanticism
trying to shake free of classicism’s structure. Liszt, whose poetic indulgence “Un
Sospiro” was to be precisely in this style, searching for the possible links between
poetic and musical expression.