French intellectuals, especially musicians and writers, were enchanted by the magic of Richard Wagner's music, but they earnestly wanted to pursue new ideas for what might follow. They believed that music and art should be free from 'German elements' and they consequently wanted to establish a decidedly contrasting, French style of music. It was for this reason that Gabriel Fauré and Camille Saint-Saëns set up the Societé Nationale de Musique in 1871, tasking it with supporting new French compositions. Successive composers were fascinated by new developments in the great French music tradition and experimented with modal alternatives and aspects of counterpoint. Compositional clarity was expected to express the simple but poetic relationship between music and text, drawing on graceful melodic lines and a Renaissance-like serenity of expression.

Milhaud was an inveterate traveller who absorbed influences from many national styles.
The music here exudes infectious dance impulses, languid geniality, knockabout humour and joie de vivre. It may inhabit a limited expressive sphere, but providing you don't expect introspection or searching profundity you won't be disappointed. There's enjoyment at every turn, whether in the foot-tapping 'Brazileira', the Satie-esque simplicity of the 'Valse' from Lessonges, or the breezy music-hall atmosphere of Le boeuf sur le toit, with its wonderfully imaginative piano writing. The performances are exemplary.

The wind quintet made up of the principal players of the Danish National Symphony are fairly well-known from their earlier recordings. And Ralf Gothóni, who joins them for Poulenc's Sextet for Piano and Winds, is a strikingly sensitive pianist, particularly in chamber settings. The program itself is very strong; it comprises basically the core of 20th-century French wind quintet literature: the Poulenc Sextet, Ibert's 'Trois Pièces brèves,' Françaix's First Wind Quintet, and Milhaud's 'Le Cheminée du roi René.'

Milhaud was so prolific and also so uneven that few of us stray far beyond the handful of works which have stayed in the repertoire. The last work of his that I heard, Le train bleu, a ballet for Diaghilev which I had long wanted to hear, was typical: it was pleasant, competent and forgettable. So when it comes to his twelve numbered symphonies I wonder whether to take the plunge. Here we have an opportunity to sample his work in the most demanding of genres. This disc of the first two symphonies was a product of Plasson’s short-lived contract with DG.

Distinguished chamber ensemble, The Fibonacci Sequence present their fifth disc in the instrument-led series of recordings focusing on music for clarinet. Now in its eighteenth year, the Fibonacci Sequence is considered one of the UK’s most distinguished chamber ensembles with a wide-ranging discography and impressive reviews. The ensemble has performed at the world’s leading festivals and venues and it has been chosen for the season 2012-2013 by the Concert Promotions Network.

Among the most adaptive and flexible – some might say eclectic and facile – of composers, Darius Milhaud was well-equipped to provide stage and ballet music that could set any scene and change moods at a moment's notice. His vivid scores, however, are most often heard today in concert, and without scenarios in hand, some imagination is required to understand how effective these works may have been for the stage. Taken at face value, Le carnaval d'Aix seems like an episodic piano concerto, L'apothéose de Molière a mediocre neo-Baroque pastiche, and Le carnaval de Londres a modern music hall rehash of John Gay's The Beggar's Opera.