Composed between July and September 1925 at the prompting of flutist René le Roy, Roussel's pithily brief Sérénade heralds the series of acerbic, linear, corybantic masterpieces that would occupy him until his death—the Suite in F (1926), Piano Concerto (1927), Psalm 80 (1928), the Symphony No. 3 (1929-1930), and the ballet Bacchus et Ariane (1930), to name but the greatest. Indeed, the Sérénade is something of a symphony in miniature, tripping its sonata-form tropes with elegant, aerial concision. Finally, it is the most brilliant, if not the most substantial, of several works for flute with which Roussel immeasurably enriched the literature for that instrument—the Deux Poèmes de Ronsard for voice and flute (1924), Joueurs de Flûte for flute and piano (1924), and the Trio for flute, viola, and cello, Op. 40 (1929).

Against a blithe, insouciantly coruscating background, the flute traverses an exposition with two themes, a development section, and a recapitulation within the space of about four minutes to make, with its adroit rhythmic shifts, an Allegro first movement of kaleidoscopic interest. The central mysterious Andante opens with a long-breathed melody for the flute over the plucked chords of a slow, sensual dance—reminiscent of the ballet sequences in Padmåvatî—sinuously answered by the cello and violin, which enter into an attenuated dialogue, rounded with an exquisite coda, suggesting an esoteric, erotic ritual. The final movement, Presto, synthesizes the visceral impact of the preceding in an animated opening dance, yielding to a sensuously sated interlude before the barbaric whirl resumes more wildly, with the flute calling through eerie string harmonics, only to vanish suddenly on a puckish cadence. The premiere was given by the Quintette Instrumental de Paris at the Salle Gaveau, Paris, on October 15, 1925.

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