The young hero of Woody Allen’s latest film “Midnight in Paris” walks through Paris in search of inspiration, and it is at this precise spot rue de la Montagne Sainte Geneviève, when the bell of church Saint Etienne du Mont rings at midnight that an antique car stops. He is invited to ride, passengers seem to belong to another time and take him in a journey in the twenties…
Le jeune héros du dernier film de Woody Allen « Midnight in Paris » traverse Paris en quête d’inspiration, et c’est à cet endroit précis rue de la Montagne Sainte Geneviève , lorsque les 12 coups de cloche sonnent minuit à l’église Saint-Etienne du Mont que s’arrête une calèche. Il est invité à monter, les passagers semblent appartenir à une autre époque et l’entrainent dans un voyage dans les année 20…
I know this curve in the road well. It is but a long block up the hill from your home on Rue Genevieve. And it is ancient. When with you in Paris, now too long ago, we visited Saint Etienne du Mont and the organ was playing. Not, of course, at the hands of the composer Durufle who, you know again, was that church’s organist for many years, but some successor. The organists in Paris churches often hold her positions for even longer than southern senators hold there’s here. Durufle was appointed organist at Saint Etienne du Mont in 1929 and remained so until his death in 1986. I imagined his requiem being played and sung there by the choir. I first heard it long ago played for me by a college friend. It is in the sway of Faure’s Requiem, which it would also please me to hear, and perhaps there in a Requiem double feature. Can you arrange it?