Reynaldo Hahn - Le bal de Béatrice d’Este (1905)

Reynaldo Hahn (August 9, 1874 – January 28, 1947) was a Venezuelan, naturalized French, composer, conductor, music critic, diarist, theater director, and salon singer. Best known as a composer of more than 100 songs, he wrote in the French classical tradition of the mélodie.
He was close friends with Marcel Proust and Sarah Bernhardt amongst many others.

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Le bal de Béatrice d’Este (1905)
Dedication: À Monsieur Camille Saint-Saëns

1. Entrée pour Ludovic le More (0:00)
2. Lesquercade (1:52)
3. Romanesque (5:15)
4. Ibérienne (8:28)
5. Léda et l'Oiseau (Intermède Léonardesque) (10:18)
6. Courante (12:10)
7. Salut final au Duc de Milan (16:22)

Harmonie Ensemble New York, conducted by Stephen Richman

The composer Reynaldo Hahn – born in Venezuela and long resident in Paris, though not yet, in 1905, a French national – was devoted to France, and interested in its historical culture. In his mélodies he made several settings of words by French poets of medieval and Renaissance times, and sometimes composed in a style evoking their eras. For Le Bal de Béatrice d'Este, however, he turned to Italian history. Beatrice d'Este was the wife of the 15th-century Duke of Milan, Ludovico ("Il Moro") Sforza. She presided over a glittering court, which included Donato Bramante, Leonardo da Vinci and other leading artists. Hahn based his suite on archaic dance measures, to portray a grand ball at the ducal palace. The suite is dedicated to Camille Saint-Saëns, with whom Hahn had studied in the 1890s.

The work was first performed privately, at the Paris house of Madeleine Lemaire on 12 April 1905; the piano part was played by the composer. The public premiere was at a concert at the Théâtre Nouveau given by the Société Moderne pour Instruments à Vent (Modern Society for Wind Instruments) on 21 May 1905. The work attracted more press attention when it featured in a high-society soirée musicale given by the Princesse de Polignac at her Paris town house in April 1907.