The two collaborative ballets from the 1920s, L’eventail de Jeanne and Les mariés de la Tour Eiffel, are available in performances by Geoffrey Simon and the Philharmonia Orchestra (Chandos 8356, recorded 1984). L’eventail de Jeanne was written in 1927 as a ballet for the young pupils of patron Jeanne Dubost. Each of L’eventail’s ten movements is by a different composer, including three members of “Les Six,” Milhaud, Poulenc and Auric, as well as Ravel, Roussel and others. Milhaud’s “Polka,” like the dances by his colleagues, is light and charming. Les mariés de la Tour Eiffel, from 1921, is a fanciful surrealist ballet with narration, originally staged in Paris by the Swedish Ballet. Its ten movements were written by five members of “Les Six” (Louis Durey declined to contribute). One movement, Milhaud’s “Fugue de Massacre,” was lost, but was recomposed in 1971. It is an impressive piece, much weightier and more modern than the rest of Les mariés, which is primarily in a frothy comic style. Simon and the Philharmonia do well with this repertoire, although Milhaud’s own 1966 recording is more idiomatic in such movements as Poulenc’s naughty “La Baigneuse de Trouville”. This older out-of-print recording also includes all of Cocteau’s scintillating narration for Les mariés, but omits L’eventail de Jeanne.
