Do you remember Prince Rostislav? he asked me. Yes, I remember him. Rachmaninov’s youthful symphonic poem, inspired by the ballad of the same name by Alexei Konstantinovich Tolstoy (Leon’s second cousin), paved the way: from The Rock to Poe’s Bells and from the Second Symphony to the Second Piano Concerto with Orchestra. Sergei Rachmaninoff is inexhaustible.

Now Mr. Gray is showing off the square CD cover. “Just released,” he says, “from the Alpha company. Title: “Nocturne”, and I remember Rachmaninoff’s favorite piano.

But these are not piano pieces. I look at the performers: the famous mixed choir La Tempete, conducted by Simon-Pierre Bestion. “In many ways, this is the perfect holiday gift for music lovers,” says Mr. Grey.

As daylight gets shorter and shorter, the concept and atmosphere of the night seems more appropriate. But, again, the album does not contain night music in the strict sense of the word. What then;

This combined sound is reminiscent of “an ocean wave that takes on countless forms”.

Traditional Byzantine psalms. And Russian Orthodox hymns composed by Rachmaninov himself: Vespers, All Nights, Orphrus. Byzantine cantor Adrian Sirbow provides rare and accurate interpretations of classical Greek Orthodox hymns. Between them, based on the order of the compositions, is Rachmaninoff with his evocative vespers included in Ergo 37, written during World War I in 1915, banned in 1917 by the Soviet regime.

In the booklet that accompanies the stunning recording, Bastion notes that he was looking for a dialogue between Rachmaninoff, this “beacon of romanticism with works for choir a cappella (Spanish without orchestral accompaniment) and unforgettable hymns of Orthodox Byzantium, which they take us into the past.” to the origins of Christian ritual. To the gifted musician, this combined sound resembles “an ocean wave that takes on countless forms”.

The night atmosphere, according to Bestion, lies in the fact that in the Orthodox rite, Vespers and Orthodoxy accompany the prayers of the faithful from dusk to dawn. “This dynamic symbolism is connected with the mystery of the cycle of daylight, which occupies a fundamental place in the rites and rituals of the Eastern churches.”

Voices echoed around the room, casting shadows and small pockets of light. In the background is a Christmas tree and winter outside the window. He too will pass.