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The Songs & The Plays - Kean on Shakespeare

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The Songs & The Plays Listen on Youtube Love’s Labours Lost (1593-94) A revised and polished version of this play was presented for Queen Elizabeth I and her court at Christmas 1598. However the elevated language and subject matter of the drama suggests it was always intended for a sophisticated and highly literate audience. There are two parallel plots – one ‘high’ comedy and one ‘low’ comedy. In the high comedy the King of Navarre and his friends make a pact to ‘fast and study’ and to have no contact with women for three years. No sooner have they agreed than the Princess of Aquitaine and her ladies in waiting arrive to discuss ‘state matters’. Inevitably the King falls in love with the Princess and his friends with the French ladies in waiting. The Gentlemen find loophole in their vows and woo and win women with a dance. The Ladies become aware of their broken vows and treat the noblemen with scorn. In the low comedy the page Moth and the clown Costard ridicule the exaggerated m...
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Francis Poulenc - Biography & Le Bestiare

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  Francis Poulenc 1899-1963   “The musical setting of a poem should be an act of love, never a marriage of convenience”.   Parisian born Francis Jean Marcel Poulenc composed more than 146 songs, ranging from the sophisticated to the elegantly simple, from playful to serious. He combined his love of poetry and the human voice with his music, finding the natural tempo, breathing places and inflections.   The Poulenc family originated from Aveyron in the south and were wealthy pharmaceutical manufacturers; founders of the now multi-national Rhône-Poulenc-Rorer. His father was a regular concert and opera-goer, but Francis received his musical gifts from his mother, Jenny Royer, an accomplished amateur pianist, who recognized his talent and gave him lessons from the age of 5. Her brother was a ‘man about town’, an amateur painter, theatre-goer and friend of celebrated actors and singers. Uncle Papoum fascinated the young Francis with his outrageous stories.   The hol...
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