Richard Franck: Orchestral Works

Prokofiev at one time described his classical symphony as written in the style as if Haydn would have survived into the 19th Century. If one could imagine Beethoven one hundred years adopting a fullblown romantic style -then you can imagine the music of Richard Franck. He was the son of another important composer: Eduard Franck (1817-1893). Richard's music is traditional in style, well-crafted and with memorable melodies. The Beethoven connection is very obvious in the first piece and very much in the Violin Serenade. The suite is a lighter piece blending lyrical ideas with a Hungarian tinge in the March. Liebesidylle and the Serenade and the cello piece are rather inward-looking pieces still very much in the great romantic style of Schumann and Mendelssohn.