ABSTRACT
Séverac’s style in his piano music varies more than in any of his other genres. Many of his works are regionalist in their programmatic references in the score and titles to the various movements. His Sonate of 1899 illustrates Sonata-Allegro form, and Le chant de la terre (1900) incorporates régionalisme together with modality in a style characteristic of ideals emphasized at the Schola Cantorum, as well as major–minor modal shifts coupled with lean lines and a texture characteristic of French Romanticism. Onomatopoeia is employed in Le chant de la terre in the form of sounds and sights from a southern French farm, which is alluded to by Séverac’s programmatic descriptions. Specific locales are represented, including Andalusian references in the form of flamenco cante jondo and guitar.
