Gramophone Classical Music Guide 2010:
"Here is 1920s French music directed by a conductor who's completely in the spirit of it, and plenty of spirit there is, too. Except for Ibert's Divertissement, this is ballet music. Poulenc's suite from Les biches, written for Diaghilev's ballet company and first heard in Monte Carlo, is fresh and bouncy and stylishly played here, although Chandos's warm recording, good though it's, takes some edge off the trumpet tone; the genial nature of it all makes us forget that it's a unique mix of 18th-century galanterie, Tchaikovskian lilt and Poulenc's own inimitable street-Parisian sophistication and charm. As for Ibert's piece, this is uproariously funny in an unbuttoned way, and the gorgeously vulgar trombone in the Waltz and frantic police whistle in the finale are calculated to make you laugh out loud. Milhaud's Le boeufsur le toit also has Parisian chic and was originally a kind of music-hall piece, composed to a scenario by Cocteau. It was while attending a performance of it in London in 1920 that the composer first heard the American jazz orchestra that, together with a later experience of New Orleans jazzmen playing 'from the darkest corners of the Negro soul' (as he later expressed it), prompted him to compose his masterly ballet La création du monde.
Tortelier and his orchestra understand this strangely powerful music no less than the other pieces. This is a most desirable disc."

FRANCIS POULENC (1899-1963)
Les Biches [20:09]
Suite d'orchestre
01. I. Rondeau
02. II. Adagietto
03. III. Rag-Mazurka
04. IV. Andantino
05. V. Final
JACQUES IBERT (1890-1962)
Divertissement [15:26]
pour orchestre de chambre
06. I. Introduction
07. II. Cortège
08. III. Nocturne
09. IV. Valse
10. V. Parade
11. VI. Finale
DARIUS MILHAUD (1892-1974)
12. Le Bœuf sur le Toit, Op. 58 [16:15]
Ballet, scénario de Jean Cocteau
La Création du Monde, Op. 81 [15:53]
Ballet, scénario de Blaise Cendrars
13. Modéré (half note = 54)
14. I. half note = 62
15. II. half note = 54
16. III. Vif (half note = 104)
17. IV. Mouvement (half note = 108)
18. V. Mouvement (half note = 62)

Ulster Orchestra
Paul Willey: Leader
Tim Holmes: alto saxophone (La Création du Monde)
Paul Schumann: clarinet (La Création du Monde)
Yan Pascal Tortelier

Recorded: Ulster Hall, Belfast, 28-30 May 1991
Producer: Tim Oldham
Sound engineer: Richard Lee; Richard Smoker (assistant)
© 1992 Chandos Records Ltd.
CHANDOS RECORDS LTD. Colchester • Essex • England
CHAN 9023