Debussy, Poulenc, Ravel & Francaix: Piano Concertos

“Debussy's unjustly-dismissed Fantasie and Francaix's pithy Concertino are the highlights of this programme, superbly interpreted by Florian Uhlig.” --BBC Music Magazine, August 2013 ****

“What an enticing programme this is...Uhlig proves a compelling advocate and the winds of the accompanying orchestra seem to gain in confidence as the work progresses...The über-compact Françaix Concertino is perhaps the highlight here, Uhlig and the orchestra vibrantly capturing the work's myriad moods, culminating in a rip-roaring finale.” --Gramophone Magazine, August 2013

A great program featuring the largely neglected piano concertos from some famous composers active in France between 1890 and 1951. Debussy's "Fantaisie" was created in a period of change, exploring how the piano could become a voice in the orchestra.

After an altercation with the work NOT being played at its scheduled 1890 premiere, the Fantasie had to wait until after Debussy's death for its first performance and is seldom heard in the concert hall today.

The contrast with the late romantic Debussy work, Ravel is represented with the bright, humorous G Major Concerto. Poulenc's Piano Concerto is a jewel of sounds and colors, yet still stands in the shadow of his Concerto for Two Pianos. Finally, there is Jean Françaix’s Concertino, composed for a short, witty ten-minute film. Charm and wit, and all the corresponding range of moods are at Florian Uhlig’s command; the result is an entertaining and musically ravishing CD.

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Franck, Debussy, Ravel: Violin Sonatas

“The most striking aspect of this challenging recital is Jennifer Pike's fearless exploration of the violin's lower dynamic range. French music is all about colour and here she reveals radiant hues and patinas that most players leave hidden under layers of interpretative accretion...Pike's dazzling interpretative flair and exemplary technique combine to create one of the most outstanding debut violin albums of recent years.” --Classic FM Magazine, June 2011 *****

 

 

“Pike's playing is muscular, her intonation immaculate. She plays a 1708 Goffriller, which has a pleasantly dark sound when required. She discovers the right mix of fantasy and nostalgia in Debussy's late Sonata...this is a most impressive debut recital disc, presenting a fully fledged artist who has much to communicate through her expressive playing.” --International Record Review, April 2011

“Pike finds much to relish in [the three sonatas], not only in her beautiful singing tone, but also in moments of hushed mystery, all captured in an admirably clear recording that slightly over-favours the violin. Debussy's multiple gear-changes, Ravel's jazz-inflected musings and Franck's intense emotions are negotiated with ease.” --BBC Music Magazine, May 2011 ****

“Pike never over-eggs the gypsy element in Debussy, the blues in Ravel or the Germanic influence in Franck: she simply makes sure they inhabit their distinctive idiom...And yet, thanks to her thoughtful, lightly worn musicianship and Martin Roscoe’s sensitive pianism, each piece retains its unmistakably Gallic flavour.” --Financial Times, 30th April 2011 ***

“thoroughly idiomatic, glistening performances of three core French violin sonatas. This is playing that brims with character, bringing a smoky seductiveness to the finale of the Debussy. Franck’s A-major sonata is given with plenty of passion tempered by winning finesse in dynamics and tonal shading.” --The Telegraph, 12th May 2011 ****

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Ravel: Daphnis et Chloé, Boléro, Pavane

“The most striking thing about these fine performances is their seductive combination of tonal warmth and sparkling virtuoso finesse...Gergiev conjures up an intoxicatingly languorous soundworld for Daphnis, fully indulging its glittering palette of orchestral colours” --Classic FM Magazine, February 2011 ****

“High voltage, but not high speed. Gergiev doesn't charge his way through the score. Indeed his measured 'Introduction et Danse religieuse' demonstrates his willingness to linger, but there's drama too. He is aided by superb playing...Boléro has precision and power” --International Record Review, December 2010

London Symphony Orchestra, Valery Gergiev

Music for the theatre has always formed a central part of Valery Gergiev’s concert repertoire. His recent recordings have included an acclaimed performance of Prokofiev’s Romeo & Juliet and in November LSO Live releases a new recording of Ravel’s score for the ballet Daphnis et Chloé. 

Ravel was commissioned by Serge Diaghilev in 1909 to write the music for Daphnis et Chloé. Although he subsequently prepared orchestral suites of the score, the complete work is a magnificent orchestral showpiece in its own right. Ravel described it as a symphonie choréographique and it is essentially an extended tone poem. Luscious orchestral colours run throughout the work, portraying the passion of the two protagonists for each other. By contrast, Pavane pour une infante défunte, composed by Ravel whilst he was still a student of Gabriel Fauré, harks back to the simplicity of the eighteenth-century music of Rameau. Boléro, one of his final works, highlights the Spanish influences and passion that pervade so many of his works.

Gergiev and the LSO perform in London during November before touring Japan. Gergiev has concerts in Paris with the Mariinsky Orchestra in December and tours again with the LSO in January and February, visiting Germany, Belgium and the US. His forthcoming LSO Live releases include a disc featuring Debussy’s La Mer, Jeux and Prélude à l’apres midi d’un faune.

Concert Reviews:

‘a performance which carried the listener breathlessly into a dance of entirely spiritual dimensions. Both demanding and obtaining a control over his orchestra which only pianists should reasonably expect from their instruments, Gergiev has always aimed high with the LSO. With this concert, they hit the bullseye’ The Guardian

‘Gergiev must count himself fortunate in having a Rolls-Royce of an orchestra, with a well-nigh infallible energy ... the sun rose as gloriously as ever, and Gergiev leapt high as dawn swung into the final Danse générale’ The Times

‘The sultry, sensual score of Ravel’s Daphnis and Chloe was handled stylishly, Gergiev and the excellent LSO properly holding something in reserve for the magnificent sunrise and exhilarating coda’ The Evening Standard

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Prokofiev & Ravel: Piano Concertos

“And this is Ravel a performance that bristles both on the keyboard and in a series of fabulous orchestral solos… a lurid delight.” --BBC Music Magazine, July 2008 *****

“Yundi Li's performance of the Prokofiev, in its prodigious, unflagging power and brilliance, far surpasses any other in the catalogue. He is no less attuned to Ravel's charm and vivacity, to music seen through a glass brightly rather than darkly.” --Gramophone Magazine, May 2008

Gramophone Magazine Editor's Choice - May 2008

“This unusual coupling contrasts two wildly different works. For some, Prokofiev's Second Piano Concerto is a work of genius, while for others it remains a monstrosity. Holding up a malevolent distorting mirror to Russian Romanticism, it carries the uneasy modernism of Rachmaninov's Fourth Concerto to its logical and devastating conclusion. Ravel's G major Concerto, on the other hand, recalls the spirits of Mozart and Saint-Saëns and contains a slow movement that is among the composer's most touching creations.

Prokofiev's Concerto is daunting and massive, Ravel's an enchanting jeu d'esprit.
Certainly Yundi Li (superbly partnered by Seji Ozawa and the Berlin Philharmonic) has few doubts about either concerto. Indeed, his performance of the Prokofiev, in its prodigious, unflagging power and brilliance, far surpasses any other in the catalogue. His moto perpetuo scherzo is vivace with a vengeance and the colossal first movement's combined development and cadenza is played with an authority that will make lesser mortals pale with envy and admiration.

He is no less attuned to Ravel's charm and vivacity, to music seen through a glass brightly rather than darkly, touching off the central Adagio with a moving simplicity and whirling us through the finale with a dazzling and engaging joie de vivre. It only remains to add that this superlative young Chinese pianist is heard in the full glory of DG's sound at its most opulent and crystalline.” --Gramophone Classical Music Guide, 2010

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Ravel: Bolero

“…the left Hand Concerto Claire Chevallier does not match Krystian Zimerman's brilliance and drive. The point is, she is not trying to. Her interpretation… is more lyrical and reflective and at times more sheerly beautiful - in fact much closer to that of Ravel's chosen interpreter Jacques Février. Whatever recordings you may have of these works, this disc is a must, balancing opulence against clarity in the orchestral sound and respecting the diamond-hard construction on which Ravel lavished so many sleepless nights.” --BBC Music Magazine, October 2006 *****

“…the perfect showcase for period instruments from early in the 20th century. …the 1905 Erard piano used in the Left-Hand Concerto, with its rather clangy, clattering tone, gives extra clarity to the flourishes in the piano part. With Claire Chevallier a most sensitive soloist, very French in style, the piano is the more clearly defined over the highly original, generally low-lying orchestration, growling up from nowhere at the start.” --Gramophone Magazine, October 2006

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Ravel: The complete solo piano music

“His tempos, kaleidoscopic tonal colouring, textual clarity, and amazing dynamic range and variety of touch manifest an innate empathy with the composer...These are inspired performances with Award Winner written all over them. The perfectly-voiced piano, the venue/acoustic, producer and engineer, and an artist who was born to play Ravel combine to make the best complete Ravel cycle on disc.” --Classic FM, April 2011 *****

Gramophone Awards 2011 Finalist - Instrumental
BBC Music Magazine Awards 2012 - Instrumental Finalist

“[Gaspard] is technically immaculate...and gently seductive before turning on a more sinister pressure..."Alborada" from Miroirs is another striking success, where a trickster's ribaldry and high jinxs explode into violence, and in La Valse (suitably arranged and "orchestrated"), Osborne spins his dancers towards a visceral and devastating oblivion.” --Gramophone, April 2011

“Ravel essentially reimagined how to write for the piano with each significant work. Osborne is more than up to the task...Throughout, [he] repeatedly demonstrates not merely that these performances stand with the best, but also that comparisons are superfluous in the face of such a compelling vision...His sustaining of the 'Epilogue' is magical, as if not wishing to relinquish the spell of this recital. It is over all too soon.” --BBC Music Magazine, May 2012 *****

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The Very Best of Adagio

". . . el sonido purísimo y único de la Deutsche y la multidimensionalidad de la Filarmónica de Berlin comparten espacio con grabaciones de cortar la respiración, pertenecientes a los dominios que mejor conocía el director." --Record Review, Melómano (Madrid), 1 February 2006

Includes work(s) by various composers. Ensemble: Berlin Philharmonic Orchestra. Conductor: Herbert von Karajan.

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French Ballet Music of the 1920s

“The zany exuberance of Les mariés, concocted by five of Les Six in the 1920s, is infectiously captured in this colourful reissue, as is L'éventail, a contemporaneous ten-composer collaboration.” --BBC Music Magazine, May 2005 ****

…these pieces are full of imagination and fun. Geoffrey Simon and the Philharmonia Orchestra give a very good account of themselves and the Chandos recording is little short of spectacular. --The Penguin Complete Guide to Compact Discs

Penguin Guide Rosette Winner

I listened to these two on-act pastiche ballets on a broiling hot, humid June night when it was 84 degrees in my living room and said, ‘who needs air conditioning! This is better than AC!’… What gorgeous playing and sound in All saints’ Church Tooting (a suburb of London). --American Record Guide

The zany exuberance of ‘Les mariés’ concocted by five of Les Six in the 1920s, is infectiously captured in this colourful reissued, as is ‘L’eventail’, a contemporaneous ten-composer collaboration. --BBC Music Magazine

All this music, Gallic in its unsentimental clarity, demands the cleanest and crispest playing, and this the Philharmonia Orchestra admirably supplies. --Gramophone

The performances under Geoffrey Simon are excellent. They deserve nothing but praise. --New York Times

The sessions evidently secured the right zippy response from the Philharmonia while also providing interestingly colourful sound quality. --Which Compact Disc

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Great Piano Concertos (10-CD Box Set)

"The box set Great Piano Concertos has been produced to celebrate the 25th anniversary of Naxos and draws on their extensive catalogue of concerto recordings. The recording quality varies from the older 1980’s recordings but there are some good things to enjoy in the 10 CD set particularly Idil Biret playing the two Chopin piano concerts with the Slovak State Philharmonic under Rubert Stankovsky. The two Liszt concertos with Eldar Nebolsin and the RLPO under Petrenko are also very enjoyable as is Jenő Jando playing the Grieg and Schumann concertos with the Budapest Symphony under András Ligeti. There are finer performances available in the catalogue of these works but this box set give an excellent introduction at a bargain price." --Audiophilia, May 2012

At the very heart of a concerto is the interplay and contrast of a solo instrument within a larger instrumental ensemble. The natural progression from the Baroque concerto grosso, the concerto as we know it was fully established as a concert staple in the eighteenth century, and many works dating from this period are still a key part of the repertoire today. The opportunity for dazzling virtuosic display from the soloist has resulted in the concerto becoming a vital musical force both on the concert platform and in the audience arena.

The most important composer in the development of the early piano concerto was Mozart, whose masterly compositions for the instrument paved the way for expansion of the form by composers such as Beethoven, Schumann, Brahms and Grieg. In the Romantic era, composers such as Rachmaninov and Tchaikovsky lent a distinctly Russian fluency and passion to the idiom, whilst no pianistic survey would be complete without the transcendent concertos of those great piano masters, Chopin and Liszt. The twentieth century transformed the piano concerto yet further with splendid offerings from a delicate Ravel, fiery Prokofiev and jazzy Gershwin to name but a few.

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