French Pianist Alexandre Tharaud Previews New Virgin Classics Release in Rare NYC Recital – April 9 at Le Poisson Rouge

By -
French pianist Alexandre Tharaud makes a rare New York appearance when he performs at Le Poisson Rouge, Manhattan’s popular downtown music club, on Monday, April 9. The program includes excerpts from Book 1 of Debussy’s Preludes, selections from Tharaud’s recent Virgin Classics release, Scarlatti: Sonatas (one of NPR’s 50 favorite recordings of 2011), and works from his upcoming jazz-inspired album, Le Boeuf Sur le Toit (The Ox on the Roof), which pays tribute to the swinging 1920s in France with a number of special guests and a captivating mix of repertoire. The new album, scheduled for release this fall, takes its name from a historic cabaret where Parisian classical musicians discovered jazz (it’s also the title of a surrealist ballet by Jean Cocteau based on a score by Darius Milhaud).

Alexandre Tharaud is increasingly recognized as one of today’s most inventive pianists, traversing a wide variety of repertoire – from Baroque masterpieces to contemporary compositions – with musicianship of arresting originality. Critical and popular response to his recordings, first for Harmonia Mundi and now Virgin Classics, for whom he records exclusively, has been overwhelmingly positive. London’s Guardian called Journal Intime, his debut release for Virgin Classics featuring works by Chopin, “altogether breathtakingly beautiful.” His March 2011 album of keyboard sonatas by Domenico Scarlatti was widely acclaimed, with Time Out New York observing that the CD “takes its place amid a distinguished recorded legacy, but Tharaud holds his own alongside" pianists like Clara Haskil, Vladimir Horowitz, and Mikhail Pletnev. In fall 2011 Tharaud released a recording of J.S. Bach keyboard concerti, performed with the Quebec-based ensemble Les Violons du Roy under its director, Bernard Labadie.

Le Boeuf Sur le Toit promises to be Tharaud’s most ambitious and surprising recording to date, a collection of 1920s classics of bohemian Paris displaying an astonishing blend of influences from late European Romanticism to Harlem jazz. The album, featuring solo works as well as collaborations with an intriguing line-up of guest stars, showcases works and arrangements by George Gershwin, Jerome Kern, W. C. Handy, Jean Wiener, Darius Milhaud, Clément Doucet (works inspired by Chopin, Wagner and Liszt), and Walter Donaldson (“Yes sir, that’s my baby,” one of the era’s signature pop songs). Guest artists include French singer-songwriter Bénabar, soprano Natalie Dessay, pianist Frank Braley, French actor Guillaume Galliène, tenor Jean Delescluse, and American-born jazz singer Madeleine Peyroux, as well a colorful array of instrumentalists performing on banjo, trumpet, trombone, clarinet, percussion, and more.

Comments

Post a Comment

Popular posts from this blog

The Role of Music in Opera

By -
There are numerous books on the topic, and every composer, librettist, director, singer and audience member has their opinion as to what role the music should play in an opera. In a play without music, the words ought to support the meaning behind a character's actions. However, in the case of action movies, often times the action is what tells the story and there aren't words, just images to forward the plot. We might hear music to accompany action, build tension, but the action tells the story. Musicals tend to speak until the emotion of the moment just "has" to break out in song - unless it's something like "Mama Mia" where the dialog is the rails we travel on between songs; the songs themselves, written before the concept of the musical, are the focus of the production, while the story is secondary. Operas are a different beast. The music provides emotion to the words spoken, but it also plays the role of ambience when there is only action. In &quo
Read more

Episode 210b: Joyeuse le départ

By -
Image
Podcast:  Play in new window  |  Download Subscribe:  Apple Podcasts  |  Android  |  Google Play  |  Stitcher  |  TuneIn  |  RSS Provost Cunningham has Transmigrated, but to where! What is Dr Sage going to do with his body? And how can she bring home her friends, Abigail and Erasmus, without also bring home Cunningham? What are they going to say when they find the “skeleton” she’s hiding in her closet? Cast: Eddie Louise Clark  as Dr Sage Chip Clark  as Professor Savant Justin Bremer  as the Narrator Emily Riley Piatt  as Abigail Entwhistle, Calypso & Dean Stewart Written by  Eddie Louise Theme music by  Unwoman Sound Design by  Chip Michael
Read more

The Art of String Quartets by Brian Ferneyhough

By -
Image
When an artist sets paint to canvas, there are brush strokes used for different effects. Sometimes those strokes are subtle, imperceptible; they produce works of art like the Mona Lisa . Other times the very obvious nature of the stroke is the art, as in works by Van Gogh. With some composers of music, the notes on the page are their craft. How those notes translate into an aural experience is what defines some composers as great artists. Brian Ferneyhough has a masterful command of the techniques of putting notes on the page. These techniques are sometimes so subtle, even though written in black and white, they escape detection. Some of what he attempts with his music is just that, to escape detection, to bury the framework, diverting the ear away from the structure, so only the music is heard . The subtlety is so fine it is almost imperceptible. Even though he studied at several institutions, he is considered self-taught, studying scores from Boule
Read more