Durey’s song-cycle (written for voice and piano or thirteen instruments) is made up of 25 individual songs each to a text by Guillaume Apollinaire and each very short. Most take just a page or two of music and contain just aline or two of verse. The concept of the work is nearly identical to that of Camille Saint-Saens’ Carnival of the Animals: each song of Le Bestiare describes an individual animal.
