The Evocation of P. Eluard’s Poetry in F. Poulenc’s Little Cantata “Snowy Evening”

Abstract

The relevance of the research topic. The topicality of the issues of the cantata “Snowy evening” is due to the terrible events of the full-scale war that is currently going on in Ukraine. Society painfully reacts to the cruel realities of today, and art helps humanity to overcome these problems. The purpose of the study. To reveal the peculiarities of the composer’s reading of Paul Eluard’s poetry in the cantata “Snowy evening” by Francis Poulenc, using a complex analysis of the musical work. The methodology. Methodological principles are based on historicism, genre-style, intonation-dramaturgical and interpretive types of analysis; in the article we have used the hermeneutic method, which makes it possible to understand the content features of the figurative interpretation of the work. The scientific novelty. Cantata “Snowy evening” by F. Poulenc is analyzed for the first time in Ukrainian musicology, as well as features of the evocation of P. Eluard’s poetry in it. The practical significance of this study lies in the expansion and deepening of theoretical knowledge about the choral work of Francis Poulenc. The results. The small cantata “Snowy evening” is a psychological portrait of a man whose life was cut short by a terrible war. The first part of the work talks about the hero’s disappointment in a cruel life; in the second part, the author condemns the moral beliefs of society to destruction and war; the third part is shown as the final destruction of the inner and surrounding world; and at the end, in the fourth part, death is presented to the listeners as the only hope for salvation. The allegorical nature inherent in Eluard’s poetry provided ample opportunities for subtle interpretation of the images and symbols depicted in the work. With the methods of musical expressiveness, harmony and rhythm, Poulenc vividly depicted the psychological state of man during the war. The compositional unity of the literary and musical layers of the cantata is determined by the logic of the evolution of the feelings and emotions of the lyrical hero. Poulenc uses a detailed approach to the verbal text, based on the music-text principle of formography. Music expands the content of poetry, brings it to a new figurative and meaningful level. The composer subordinates the music to the free metric of the poem. The original cantata style combines the stylistic principles of different eras. The composer uses the expressive means of ancient genres and the principles of modern choral writing. The search for new harmonic structures and combinations allowed Poulenc to expand the timbral colors of the choir. The author uses different types of texture in the cantata. This tool helps to reveal the author’s message about the inseparability of personal and civic sense of self, the inseparability of the fate of every citizen from the fate of the nation. Despite the numerical structure, the cantata has many common intonation connections that pass through all parts of the cycle and create a unity of plot and space.