Sonata for cello and piano no. 2 op. 117

Relieved of his duties as Director of the Paris Conservatoire from 1920, Gabriel Fauré wrote several works with valedictory accents in his twilight years, including this carefree and radiant Second Sonata for cello and piano. While drafting it in March 1921, Fauré had in mind Saint-Saëns’s Sonata for cello and piano No. 1, “a masterpiece that is heard too rarely, because cellists claim that their part is less brilliant than that of the piano! As if, in a combined work, the total effect did not result from the combination of different instruments”, he wrote to Paulette Mayer. Delayed by illness, the completion of the manuscript owed much to his friend Marguerite Hasselmans, who seems to have finished it under his dictation. The work is dedicated to the violinist Charles-Martin Loeffler (1861–1935), the retired composer’s patron. It was first performed at the Société Nationale de Musique on 13 May 1922 by Gérard Hekking and Alfred Cortot, who had already premiered the First Sonata op. 109 in 1918. At a time when the Parisian musical world was discovering polytonality, Fauré proved faithful to himself and comforted those who pined for the Belle Époque, such as Vincent d’Indy: “I want to tell you that I’m still under the spell of your beautiful Cello Sonata. In it I found Music, which one seems to be forgetting nowadays and trying to replace with rather unpleasant agglomerations of sounds. Your Andante is a masterpiece of sensitivity and expression, and I love the finale, so perky and gripping”(14 May 1922).