Lea Desandre / Thomas Dunford / Jupiter AMAZONE

 

AMAZONE

Alexandra Ivanova SENTIMENT

 

SENTIMENT

 

Ensemble Correspondances / Sébastien Daucé LES PLAISIRS DU LOUVRE

                                                       LES PLAISIRS DU LOUVRE

Luc Beauséjour MOMENTS BAROQUES AU PIANO

 The repertoire on this recording was written for harpsichord during the Baroque period, generally considered to span the years 1600 to 1750. While many pianists have played Bach, Scarlatti, Handel, Rameau, and even Couperin and Froberger, few harpsichordists have come to the defence of the harpsichord repertoire on the modern piano.

The idea was born during a meeting with Analekta president, François Mario Labbé. I was submitting some recording proposals for harpsichord and clavichord, and he asked me, “Why not make a CD of piano music?” Somewhat taken aback, I asked for a few days to think about it.

Not long after, I suggested a program that would not only include harpsichord repertoire already covered by pianists–Bach, Scarlatti, and Handel– but would also feature some lesser-known works. In compiling this program, I played for several friends on various occasions to get their opinions. After reading through quite a number of works, I selected those that appealed to me most and that I felt worked best on the piano.

Some pieces borrowed from the harpsichord repertoire sound very good on the piano, but I quickly realized that not all Baroque repertoire lends itself to the modern instrument with equal satisfaction.  (Luc Beauséjour)

Silvia Márquez CHACONNERIE

Chaconnerie is a recording that deals with repetition. Chaconnerie illustrates that particular principle of Art that seeks to combine elements over and over again to achieve balance and unity. Chaconnerie encourages us to undertake a voyage in which sounds –through the centuries– build upon an insistently repeated, or imaginatively varied, scheme. Repetition has been a major element of humankind’s artistic manifestations and expressions ever since the time of the moais on Easter Island up to the drawings of Max C. Escher. Repetition is rhythm, pulse, and life, and life overflows in the chaconne, a dance whose origin Lope de Vega attributed to the American Indian (“from the Indies to Seville / it has come by post”) and whose character Miguel de Cervantes describes as lascivious and immoral. With its accent on the second beat and its variations on a harmonic scheme, this dancing base – together with sarabandes, folias, and passacaglias – was conducive to improvisation on chordal progressions, a novelty that had a crucial impact on Baroque music in Europe.

Christophe Rousset LOUIS COUPERIN Nouvelles Suites de Clavecin

The new Stradivari series from harmonia mundi allows listeners to explore the unique instruments lovingly preserved at the Philharmonie de Paris's Museum of Music. Thanks to the skill and commitment of the museum's conservators, these instruments are given a new life. On this release, the great Christophe Rousset plays a rare harpsichord crafted in 1652 by Ioannes Couchet. Through his virtuosity and the instruments sonority the sumptuousness and grace of Louis Couperin's Nouvelles Suites are clearly revealed.

Pavel Kolesnikov LOUIS COUPERIN

Long overshadowed by his famous nephew François, Louis Couperin’s reputation has increased tenfold over the past decade or so. More harpsichordists (at least on disc) are embracing this composer’s unfettered imagination and ability to generate extraordinary harmonic tension and release. So has one very special pianist, evidently.

Pavel Kolesnikov brings vitality, meaning, and stylish aplomb to this music by utilizing harpsichord-oriented technique like intricate overlapping finger legato, while at the same time making discreet use of the piano’s dynamic and tonal shadings. It helps that Kolesnikov’s Yamaha piano features two contrasting actions, one of which conveys the bristling yet muted immediacy of a harpsichord lute stop, notably at the outset of the two great G minor Passacaille and in the A major Gigue. In addition, Kolesnikov’s intelligent balancing of lines and specificity of arpeggiation gives a modern “spin” to Couperin’s gnawing dissonances and passing tones, such as in the D minor Chaconne.

A conversational outlook informs how the pianist articulates ornaments and flourishes in the various Allemandes, to the point where the basic dance rhythms are implied more than overtly stated. While nothing flashy characterizes the nearly eight-minute-long F-sharp minor Pavane, Kolesnikov creates an understated yet palpable dramatic atmosphere through his variegated touch and rhythmic fluidity.

Adrian Powney’s scholarly annotations never spill over into arcane obscurity, while Hyperion’s engineering holds a close-up yet full-bodied sonic mirror to the care and conciseness behind Kolesnikov’s conceptions. Not since Marcelle Meyer’s classic 1953 Rameau recordings have I heard French Baroque keyboard music befit the modern concert grand so naturally as on this remarkable release. (Classics Today)

Ensemble Mare Nostrum / Andrea De Carlo LE CONCERT DES VIOLES

Whilst Italian composers had taken up the ‘modern' form of the sonata and adapted it to the violin at the beginning of the 17th century, French composers remained faithful to the principles of polyphonic music with their fantaisies that were still intended for ensembles of viols; the role of the violin in France at that time was still limited to providing music for dancing. Such knowledge of polyphony was demanded not only from composers of vocal music but also from organists, one of whom was Louis Couperin and who was also dessus de viole de la chambre du Roi. Our recording comes to a fitting conclusion with the last French work to be written for ensemble of viols: Marc-Antoine Charpentier's Concert à quatre parties de violes.