Nicolas Chalvin and Renaud Capuçon perform Milhaud and Ravel

In 2016, the Orchestra of the Pays de Savoie came to Évian to present a French-themed concert program. They began with Ravel’s Le Tombeau de Couperin, a piece that draws on the “tombeau”, a French baroque musical genre employed to lament the passing of admired individuals, Ravel’s masterpiece reinterprets the genre in 20th century terms, honor friends who fell during the World War I. The program continues when dancers take the stage to join Nicolas Chalvin, who leads the orchestra in Darius Milhaud's Creation of the World, a ballet deeply influenced by jazz and blues, genres that captivated the French composer. The program culminates when French violinist Renaud Capuçon joins the musicians for Milhaud’s Cinéma-Fantaisie d’après Le Boeuf sur le toit, Op. 58b, a thrilling work that weaves together a solo violin’s lyrical melancholy with the orchestra’s scintillating Latin American rhythms.