Franck, Boulanger, Debussy & Vermeulen: Works for Cello and Piano

In late-19th-century France, instrumental music began to emerge from the long shadow of opera and vocal traditions, fueled by the ideals of the Société Nationale de Musique. The works gathered on Franck, Boulanger, Debussy & Vermeulen: Works for Cello and Piano trace that evolution through four distinct yet subtly connected voices.

César Franck’s Sonata in A major, originally conceived for violin and soon authorized in a cello version, stands as one of the great monuments of the French chamber repertoire. Its remarkable cyclic unity and expansive lyricism combine structural rigor with glowing Romantic expressiveness. Transferred to the cello, the music acquires a deeper, more vocal warmth without losing any of its architectural clarity.

Although celebrated primarily as one of the twentieth century’s most influential pedagogues, Nadia Boulanger possessed a refined compositional voice of her own. The Trois Pièces reveal an economy of means, elegant lyricism, and a natural sensitivity to instrumental color.

With the Sonata for cello and piano, Claude Debussy reimagines classical proportion through a wholly individual language. Evoking the world of the commedia dell’arte, the work moves between introspection, fantasy, and nervous brilliance, the piano often acting as a shimmering, elusive partner.

Debussy’s example proved catalytic for Matthijs Vermeulen, whose cello sonata transforms late-Romantic expressivity into a highly personal idiom of surging melodic lines and explosive contrasts. Its opposing movements — associated by the composer with Venus and Mars — embody tenderness and turbulence in equal measure.

Performed by Lidy Blijdorp and Tobias Borsboom, this program reveals a richly varied soundscape where French refinement, color, and emotional intensity converge.

Lidy Blijdorp, Cello
Tobias Borsboom, Piano