There are no bar-lines in Car nos vignes sont en fleur (Our vines are in bloom) by the Dutch composer Ton de Leuuw. The music grows and subsides on the horizontal score like mirror images of a soundwave – an image on the score expressed in musical terms.

The singers are placed in a semi-circle with altos and tenors at the centre, where it all begins with a gentle humming. Listening is key. The soloists need to begin to sing in a well-considered, flexible way “without haste”. Each singer in the twelve-voice choir depends on the others as individual phrases – each with its distinct tempo – links up with the others in a gentle, focused flow that eventually arrives at a unison repetition of aime, aime, aime, “loves, loves, loves”.

Through calm, precise instructions, Ton de Leuuw guides us in an intimate conversation about the deeper meaning of love. One of the composer’s aims is the contrast between the passion and urgency of the text and the introspective character of the music. Throughout the twenty-minute piece all that exists is you and I, or I and my own thoughts. We take our time. We don’t need to display our love to the world, all we want is to explore its mysteries.

Ton de Leuuw’s interpretation of the Song of Songs is about love, but also about the fear of losing love, searching for it, hope and despair, and ultimately the final union, also in the spiritual sense. The work is divided into these distinct parts, and after the passionate outburst of “takadama” in the sixth part, the unison, hymn-like finale offers a moment of respite.

Text: Janna Vettergren

Cinq Rechants (Five Refrains) for twelve solo voices was composed in 1948 as part of the Tristan and Isolde trilogy that also includes the song-cycle Harawi: Chants d’amour et de mort and the Turangalîla symphony. All three are variations on the myth of love.

The title of the work is a tribute to the Renaissance composer Claude Le Jeune and his famous work Le Printemps (Spring). According to Messiaen, Le Printemps is “a masterpiece for choir and a masterpiece of rhythm”.

Messiaen composed Cinq Rechants at a time when his first wife, Claire Delbos, was admitted to a psychiatric institution after a breakdown. The composer is also the author of the poetic text. It is partly in surrealist French, partly in an invented language and syllables borrowed from Quechua (an indigenous language of Peru) and Sanskrit. Some of the text is based on French translations of the Tristan and Isolde myth, which contains many symbols referring to love. The invented words have been chosen for their sweetness or hardness and their ability to accentuate the rhythms through their sound, intensity, intonation and duration.

Messiaen was inspired by the Harawi musical tradition of the indigenous Inca, and Yaraví, a traditional sorrowful love song from Peru and Ecuador. This piece was also inspired by alba, a song style popular in the Middle Ages in which the lovers are woken at dawn by a “voice from above” telling them that their lovemaking will soon come to an end. Messiaen combined non-European rhythms, for example from India (deçi-tâlas), with his own modal technique, which he referred to as non-retrogradable rhythms.

Cinq Rechants is a unique song-cycle full of repeated refrains and rhythmic complexities that come together to form a varied, rich texture.

Text: Andreas Konvicka

Although the Song of Songs has been a symbol of the love between humans and God for millennia, we are more likely to enjoy these poetic Bible texts as expressions of the human desire for physical love – of timeless erotic desire.

How beautiful and pleasant you are,
O loved one, with all your delights!
Your stature is like a palm tree,
and your breasts are like its clusters.
I say I will climb the palm tree
and lay hold of its fruit.

The composer, radio director, teacher and member of L’Academie Française, Jean Yves Daniel-Lesur, was born in Paris in 1908 as Daniel Jean Yves Lesur. He met Olivier Messiaen at the Paris Conservatory, and the two composers became friends, colleagues, and creators of the influential ensemble Jeune France. Daniel-Lesur covered the full range of the classical repertoire, from opera and orchestral music to chamber music. The common denominator for his compositions is breathing. Song is central even to his instrumental music, and the human voice is expressed metaphorically – he gives voice, for example, to non-European inspiration – as well as literally. Le Cantique des cantiques (Song of Songs or The Song of Solomon) is most closely associated with Daniel-Lesur.

His musical setting of the Song of Songs penetrates to the mystery of the text, the rites, the sensual words exchanged between two young lovers. Sandal-clad feet and blushing cheeks, sleepless nights and intimate conversations. We meet King Solomon, his guards, the daughters of Jerusalem and the dancing Shulamite. We travel through secret gardens, deserts, vineyards, cities at night and across spice-scented mountains – but the opening word is alleluia. From Hebrew, via Greek, the old, sacred words permeate and inform the work.

Le Cantique de cantiques is a choral work of symphonic quality – complex and expressive for multiple voices. However, it requires strong soloists and offers scope for individual interpretation. The twelve voices intertwine in romantic triads, Eastern scales, solo performances and magnificent, perfect harmonies. Daniel-Lesur’s love story has been cherished by choirs and audiences since 1953.

Text: Janna Vettergren