Francis Poulenc, articles and interviews: notes from the heart

?He plays the piano well,? wrote the society hostess Mme de Saint-Marceaux in her diary on 18 March 1927. ?His compositions are not devoid of talent but he?s not a genius, and I?m afraid he thinks he is.?

Intelligent though the lady was, she got this one spectacularly wrong.

Poulenc has in fact outpaced his colleagues in Les Six by many a mile, as singers and instrumentalists all over the world will attest, and while he would never have accepted the title of ?genius?, preferring ?artisan?, a genius is increasingly what he appears to have been.