Occident et Orient Op 25 - Camille Saint Saëns

The French Revolution had a profound effect on many facets of life, not least on that of the military band of the 18th Century. The cosy “chamber music” band of the Harmonie of Haydn and Mozart, Beethoven and Krommer, with its pairs of woodwind and horns, was expanded enormously when in 1789 Bernard Sarette first raised the band of the Garde Nationale, a group of some forty-five players, from which evolved the massive forces which supported the great fetes through which the politicians put over their ideals of Liberty, Equality and Fraternity. It was for these bands that Catel, Louis and Hyacinth Jadin, Mehul and Reicha wrote their “revolutionary” symphonies and marches.

In their hands, the oboe was replaced as the main solo instrument by the clarinet, and a little later the middle of the band was thickened by the addition of saxophones and sax horns. The Grande Harmonie for which Saint Saëns wrote this work included three saxophones, chromatic horns, chromatic bugles And a Basse à 4 cylindres. In this new edition published by Maecenas, we have tried to preserve the flavour of the original scoring, while making it accessible for the contemporary band by utilising cross-cuing. 

The Occident is characterised by a fine sweeping melody of great energy, followed by a Trio which might have been written by a British march composer. The central section, Orient, is a moderato with a unison melody typical of French balletic and operatic 19th century forays into the Orient. The main theme returns in a brief fugato leading to a restatement of the opening material but treated with more urgency and combined with the oriental music. 

It is hard to see why such a fine original concert piece from the romantic era should have remained unpublished and relatively inaccessible for so long.