Melodies of Provence

From the very beginning of his career, Marcel Pagnol gave an essential place to the music of his films. From "Marius“ (1931) to "Letters from My Windmill“ (1954), it fulfilled a singular function, accompanying the dialogue, heightening emotion, and expressing what words alone could not convey. Rejecting scores simply added in post-production, Pagnol sought a genuine artistic collaboration with his composers. The works composed by Vincent Scotto, Arthur Honegger, Henri Tomasi, Paul Misraki, Raymond Legrand, among others, bear witness to a profoundly musical conception of cinema. This programme offers, for the first time, a restoration of this forgotten heritage. As most of the original scores have been lost, a meticulous reconstruction has been undertaken through musicological research and the orchestration work of composer and arranger Cyril Lehn, for the Orchestre national de Cannes under the direction of Benjamin Levy.