Berceuse

Berceuse (FR) Lullaby. Poulenc's setting (1931, Cinq Poèmes de Max Jacob #4) for voice and piano of the poem »Berceuse de la petite servante« (Lullaby of the Little Servant Girl), the 32nd poem from Poèmes de Morven le Gaëlique (Poems of Morven the Gaelic, 1953, posth.). The title is ironic because the poem is anything but designed to put a child to sleep, and the music is that of a rude cabaret-style waltz. Poulenc writes: »Everything being reversed in this poem — father at Mass, mother at the…