Beauty will save the world', wrote Dostoyevsky, which is the claim that Camille Thomas makes throughout this record. Not beauty for the sake of hedonism, but a beauty that believes there is a burning line to be drawn between pain and hope. Camille Thomas' new album illustrates this, structured like an archipelago surrounding the 'Cello Concerto' composed by Fazil Say. Camille Thomas gave its premiere in 2018, and her album spanning the work of ten composers, allows us to travel the path from pain to hope. On the threshold, we meet three pieces: the heart-rending melody of the 'Kaddisch' by Ravel, a sublimation of the Jewish prayer for the dead; the lamentation from Purcell's 'Dido', quasi a lullaby from the queen who awaits her death, in a nakedness without pathos; and between those two works, the tender 'Dance of the Blessed Spirits' from Gluck's 'Orfeo', in which we hear the first signals of hope.
Track Listing:
1. Deux mélodies hébraïques, Kaddisch (Maurice Ravel) - Camille Thomas/Brussels Philharmonic
2. Orfeo ed Euridice, Wq30, Dance of the Blessed Spirits (Christoph Willibald Gluck) - Camille Thomas/Brussels Philharmonic
3. Dido and Aeneas, Z626, When I Am Laid in Earth (Dido's Lament) (Henry Purcell) - Camille Thomas/Brussels Philharmonic
4. Cello concerto, op. 73, 'Never give up', Never Give Up (Fazil Say) - Camille Thomas/Brussels Philharmonic
5. Cello concerto, op. 73, 'Never give up', Terror - Elegy (Fazil Say) - Camille Thomas/Brussels Philharmonic
6. Cello concerto, op. 73, 'Never give up', Song of Hope (Fazil Say) - Camille Thomas/Brussels Philharmonic
1. Kol Nidrei, Op. 47 (Max Bruch) - Camille Thomas/Brussels Philharmonic
2. Wesendonck-Lieder, WWV91, Träume (Richard Wagner) - Camille Thomas/Brussels Philharmonic
3. Gypsy melodies, op. 55, B104, Songs My Mother Taught Me (Antonin Dvorák) - Camille Thomas/Brussels Philharmonic
4. Theme from Schindler's List (John Williams) - Camille Thomas/Brussels Philharmonic
5. Werther, Pourquoi Me Réveiller (Jules Massenet) - Camille Thomas/Brussels Philharmonic
6. L'elisir d'amore, Una Furtiva Lagrima (Gaetano Donizetti) - Camille Thomas/Brussels Philharmonic
7. Norma, Casta Diva (Vincenzo Bellini) - Camille Thomas/Brussels Philharmonic
