Robert Oubussier (L) – Ernest Ansermet (R)

Back to Switzerland this weekend for another rarity. This time it’s the music of Robert Oboussier – his Introitus for Orchestra written in 1946 and performed here in this radio recording featuring the Suisse Romand Orchestra, conducted by Ernest Ansermet and recorded in January 1951.

Robert Oboussier’s early works show influences of late Romanticism . In his instrumental works, he explored twelve-tone technique , and in a later phase of his career, he combined Baroque forms with contemporary counterpoint and expanded harmony , achieving his most personal expression in his vocal works. His choral compositions based on poems by Eichendorff , Hebbel , Brentano , Claudius , Rilke , and Anna de Noailles , as well as his a cappella arrangements of old English songs, received the greatest acclaim .

He composed an opera, Amphitryon (based on Molière’s comedy of the same name ), symphonic works, chamber music , works for piano and vocal works, including Antigone for alto and orchestra. His book The Symphonies of Beethoven : Introductions (commissioned by the Berlin Philharmonic Orchestra ) has been reprinted several times. His Berlin Music Chronicle 1930–1938 was published in Zurich in 1969 by Martin Hürlimann . [ 3 ]

His papers are housed in the Zurich Central Library . 

In May 1954 Decca recorded Ernest Ansermet and the Suisse Romande orchestra in Europe’s first commercial stereophonic recordings. They went on to record the first stereo performance of the complete The Nutcracker by Tchaikovsky on LP (Artur Rodziński had already recorded a stereo performance on magnetic tape, but this had been released on LP only in mono). Ansermet also conducted early stereo recordings of Debussy‘s Nocturnes and the Prélude à l’après-midi d’un faune. Part of his recording of The Rite of Spring, augmented by a rehearsal recording unobtainable elsewhere, was used by Decca on the company’s 1957 stereo demonstration LP, A Journey into Stereo Sound. The conductor’s clear and methodical counting of beats is a distinct feature of this rehearsal sequence. In his last years he and his ensemble recorded works by Haydn, Beethoven and Brahms. In 1962, Ansermet made the first complete recording of Joseph Haydn‘s Paris symphonies with the OSR on Decca.

His last recording, of Stravinsky’s The Firebird, was made in London with the New Philharmonia Orchestra in 1968, which included a recording of the rehearsal sessions issued as a memorial to him. Another late recording for Decca, also issued as a memorial album, was with L’Orchestre de la Suisse Romande, and was devoted to Albéric Magnard‘s Symphony No. 3 and Édouard Lalo‘s Scherzo for Orchestra.

Ansermet composed some piano pieces and compositions for orchestra, among them a symphonic poem entitled Feuilles de Printemps (Leaves of Spring). He also orchestrated Debussy’s Six épigraphes antiques in 1939.

He died on 20 February 1969 in Geneva at the age of 85.

On to the music.