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See Terms & Conditions for p&p rates. | |  | Arturo Benedetti Michelangeli plays Ravel & Debussy
A tribute to Arturo Benedetti Michelangeli, a veritable mythic and unpredictable Italian pianist,; a perfectionist with a carefully chosen repertory in which Scarlatti's works joined those of Debussy and Ravel, while the great German romantics, from Beethoven to Brahms, were magnified and exalted, showing the soundness of their construction. The number of his recordings is limited, with mostly works by Debussy and Ravel and a few by Beethoven. He used to buy pirate live discs of his concerts as presents for his friends instead of his 'official' recordings! Here is a French anthology collecting legendary renderings of his inimitable touch easy to recognise by its ductile nature and the purity of his style. A revived masterpiece. Recorded Live May 22 1960 London [Gaspard, Concerto], February 12 1952 [Valses], June 3 1960 [Debussy] | 
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| |  | Debussy: Solo Piano Music
Angela Hewitt’s previous forays into the French repertoire have been praised for their ‘tenderness, Gallic wit, verve, and—the most important ingredient of all—charm’. These qualities are very much to the fore in this new disc of Debussy featuring some of the composer’s most sunlit, delightful and popular works. Children’s Corner was written for Debussy’s beloved daughter (though not, as Hewitt explains, for her to play immediately). Hewitt embraces the music’s wit, artful references and gentle beauty. The atmospheric Suite bergamasque includes the famous ‘Clair de lune’. Also included are the tragic Masques and gorgeously exuberant L’isle joyeuse. Hewitt and Debussy are a perfect match. “Hewitt’s spectrum of touch, her fluency and sense of colour are deployed with equal enchantment in the first of the two arabesques, her lightness, rhythmic precision and varieties of tonal weight making the second arabesque into a glistening, fanciful filigree...Hewitt brilliantly and sensitively points up the traits that lend the music such distinctive character and evocative presence, not least in an account of “L’Isle joyeuse” that is pure, ravishing radiance.” The Telegraph, 5th October 2012 ***** “There's not a trace of the "impressionistic" about her treatment of any of them: this is Debussy portrayed in clean, bright colours and sharply focused detail, with every rhythm precisely etched...it's undeniably high-class playing, even when you don't agree with some of its details.” The Guardian, 4th October 2012 **** “This is one of the better offerings for Debussy's 150th anniversary...This generously filled disc finds Hewitt utterly persuasive in the three suites at its heart...Hyperion caputres the sound marvellously. Hewitt has the knack of noticing details without letting them detract from the musical flow...Special mention should be made of 'Clair de lune': it is quite an achievement for its lyrical beauty to be heard afresh.” BBC Music Magazine, December 2012 ***** “Hewitt has put together an ideal introduction to Debussy, but it’s one that can be enjoyed equally by experienced listeners – thanks to the artless touch and precise colours the Canadian pianist brings to each piece.” Financial Times, 27th October 2012 **** | | | In stock - usually despatched within 1 working day. |
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| |  | Debussy: Preludes
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| |  | Debussy: La Mer, Images, Nocturnes & Jeux
When Claude Debussy (1862-1918) composed his Prélude à l'après-midi d'un faune in 1894, nothing quite like it had been heard before. At the time it totally revolutionised music and set a new path for music in the century to come. It was during 1905 that Debussy spent some months residing in Eastbourne in England where he completed one of his greatest works – La Mer (The Sea). He had taken refuge in England with his pregnant mistress, Emma Bardac, to escape the scandal caused by the attempted suicide of his then wife. Shortly after returning to Paris, Bardac gave birth to Debussy's only child, Claude-Emma, to whom he dedicated the piano original of his Children's Corner. The Ballet score Jeux was Debussy's last orchestral work, being written in 1912 for Diaghilev's Ballet Russes with choreography by Nijinsky. It is a complex piece, made up of many small musical cells and changes of tempo. | | | In stock - usually despatched within 1 working day. |
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| |  | Jean-Bernard Pommier plays Debussy
Claude Debussy was an excellent pianist, and Marguerite Long, who worked with him, admired “the suppleness, caress and depth of his touch”, as well as his “full, intense sonority, free of any harshness in the attack, like Chopin”. After the elegant, delicate Arabesques of 1888, in 1901 Debussy published his first important piano work, Pour le piano, in the tradition of the great baroque keyboard masters whom he so admired; it was to his dear daughter Chouchou, born in 1905, that he dedicated the six simple miniatures of Children’s Corner, a blend of emotion, playfulness and humour. “When one can’t afford to travel, one must make do with the imagination,” he said, commenting on the Estampes, whose heady sonorities and magical evocations refer to the Orient, Spain, and the spirit of France; Debussy was also capable of irony, as in La Plus que lente, composed in 1910 as “café music”. Less well-known, the Pièce pour le Vêtement du blessé was composed for a charity during the First World War devoted to dressing the wounds of soldiers. Marguerite Long described L’Isle joyeuse (1904) as an exuberant, “joyful gust of wind” and “a celebration of rhythm”; it is also a superb exploration of tone-colour and nuance. “Pommier's Debussy selection displays many facets of both the composer and performer. Children's Corner is spirited and the Estampes particularly engaging. The highlight is a wonderfully droll La plus que lente.” BBC Music Magazine, December 2009 | | | In stock - usually despatched within 1 working day. |
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| |  | Nelson Freire plays Debussy
Brazilian pianist Nelson Freire is among the truly great living musicians. His recordings and live performances receive rapturous critical acclaim, and his remarkable musicianship continues to captivate the critics and charm the musical world. Freire has a special affinity with Debussy's music and his magical style perfectly suits these luminous works. “The Brazilian takes on Debussy favourites (Preludes: Book 1, Children's Corner and Claire de Lune) with his usual dazzling clarity. Impressive in his keyboard scope, he offers moments of engaging insight. But while his note-striking is pure and brilliant, elsewhere Freire has a somewhat meaty approach, the detached perfection and button-brightness occasionally jarring with the more poetic, subtle ripples of Debussy's music.” The Times, 7th February 2009 *** “…Nelson Freire… confesses to a special empathy for Debussy… and you will be hard pressed to find a recital of comparable warmth, affection and finesse. When you have heard "Voiles" gives with a greater sense of mystery… or witnessed playing throughout Book 1 of the Préludes more delicate, rapt and precise? Clair de lune, added, as it were, as an encore, is dreamy and magically remote...” Gramophone Magazine, April 2009 “Nelson Freire, the legendary Brazilian pianist and longtime musical partner of Martha Argerich, turns to Debussy. In the accompanying notes he confesses to a special empathy for Debussy and you will be hard pressed to find a recital of comparable warmth, affection and finesse. Here, there is no need for spurious gestures and inflections; everything is given with a supreme naturalness and a perfectly accomodated virtuosity that declare Freire a master pianist throughout. When have you heard 'Voiles' given with a greater sense of its mystery or witnessed playing throughout Book 1 of the Préludes more delicate, rapt and precise? There is lightly worn fantasy and expertise in 'La sérénade interrompue' and the direction Profondément calme (dans une brumedoucement sonore) is distilled into something close to perfection. Always Freire 'evokes rather than spells out' and has one every heard a more subtle or engaging way with 'Dr Gradus ad Parnassum' (from the Children's CornerSuite). Clair de lune, added, as it were, as an encore, is dreamy and magically remote, making you long for further Debussy from this artist. Decca's sound is warm and brilliant.” Gramophone Classical Music Guide, 2010 | | | In stock - usually despatched within 1 working day. |
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| |  | Debussy - Complete Works for Solo Piano Volume 3
Jean-Efflam Bavouzet here offers the third volume in his series devoted to the complete works for piano by Debussy. The music now moves to a more playful strand in Debussy’s compositional career, with generally shorter pieces of the salon genre, including the two famous collections Children’s Corner and Suite bergamasque. In addition to these well-known works are several that are more rarely heard. Two such are La plus que lente, which seems to look ahead to the Études of 1915, and Élégie. Roger Nichols describes the former as ‘one of his most delightful pieces… the harmonic turns are particularly sophisticated and enchanting’. The Élégie was written in 1915 following the composer’s move to the coast. The outbreak of the First World War had initially depressed Debussy into a state of creative sterility but the move was to prove most productive. The Élégie was written for a charity and, dedicated to Queen Alexandra, honours the role of women in wartime. It is now rarely performed but Roger Nichols writes, ‘it is one of the composer’s most extraordinary works… and we are left wondering what on earth Debussy would have written in the 1920s and beyond’. Bavouzet’s previous two volumes have been very well received both critically and commercially. In a recent review of volume two the LA Times wrote, ‘In what may turn out to be the greatest complete recorded survey of the composer’s piano music yet, Jean-Efflam Bavouzet… plays with such bracing clarity that hearing the early Romantic pieces, one feels like jumping into an icy pond after an hour in the sauna’. Of the same volume International Record Review has noted, ‘I had the highest praise for Jean-Efflam Bavouzet’s first volume of Debussy, and the present disc is fully the equal of that one in terms of colour, refinement of touch, spontaneity and technical finish… Bavouzet has written that his Debussy playing has been influenced by that of Gieseking, Michelangeli and Richter. You may hear something of each of these pianists in his playing but more than that you will hear his own distinctive and special voice’. This series is a deeply personal project for Bavouzet who has been involved in all aspects of the recording process. “This third volume confirms Jean-Efflam Bavouzet's winning affinity for Debussy's music. Such familiar pieces as the Suite bergamasque, Deux Arabesques or Children's Corner come across with their colours luminous, their ideas voiced fluently and the moods atmospherically fixed.” The Telegraph, 31st May 2008 “Fiercely energised yet superfine, his performances are not for those with comfortable drawing-room notions of Debussy.” Gramophone Magazine, July 2008 “…this delightful disc places Debussy's two most modest cycles (Children's Corner and Suite bergamasque) within a broadly chronological sequence of pieces spanning the composer's career.” BBC Music Magazine, June 2008 ***** “Volume 3 of Jean-Efflam Bavouzet's superb Debussy cycle links mostly early miniatures with the Suite bergamasque and Children's Corner.
Once more he turns conventional notions of 'impressionism' topsy-turvy, cleansing Debussy of years of dust and accretion and recreating him in every bar in a sparkling and pristine light.
Fiercely energised yet superfine, his performances are not for those with comfortable drawing- room notions of Debussy, and rarely in my experience has a pianist so faultlessly or precisely achieved his aims.
All sentimentality is erased from the Nocturne's enchanting evanescence and just when he momentarily has you wishing that his formidable directness would melt into something more heart-easing, he makes you gasp at his flawless balance of sense and sensibility. He makes something audaciously epic out of Hommage à Haydn and the startling hesitancy in the opening of 'The Snow is Dancing' is convincing rather than idiosyncratic.
His recital ends on a desolating note with the Berceuse héroïque's phantom battle-cries and bugle-calls memorably evoked. The superbly recorded disc includes his own remarkable essay.
This could well be the finest and most challenging of all Debussy piano cycles.
A greater study in contrast in 'composer and interpreter' would be hard to imagine then between Bavouzet and Pascal Rogéacute;. Where Bavouzet breaks out into blazing Mediterranean sunlight, Rogéacute; (radically enriching his earlier Decca Debussy discs) is happy to withdraw into shadow-land. Time and again his playing suggests emotion recollected in tranquillity rather than turmoil; and in, say, 'Hommage à Rameau' or the Sarabande from Pour le piano he discovers the mysterious, still centre of Debussy's art.
'Poissons d'or' is a marvellous distillation of indolence and flashing disruption, and 'Mouvement' is a perky and vivacious rejoinder to all former introspection. And so too is the Toccata, played with unerring ease and grace, and with many ear-catching details.
To summarise, the ever-elusive truth lies somewhere between Rogéacute; the dreamer, Bavouzet the sinewy but always musical athlete, Thibaudet, the teasing wit and sophisticate and, of course, the legendary Gieseking. You pays your money and you takes your choice…” Gramophone Classical Music Guide, 2010 “Debussy playing does not come any better than this” Penguin Guide, 2011 edition | | | (also available to download from $10.50) | In stock - usually despatched within 1 working day. |
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| |  | Debussy - Images
“Simon Trpceski turns to Debussy's withdrawn poetry and fantasy with an ease and delicacy that suggest, once more, a wholly exceptional artist.
He is, perhaps above all, harmonically aware, with every change of colour and sonority subtly underpinned, making you doubly aware of Debussy's chiaroscuro, his infinite play of light and shade. The First Arabesque could hardly be more charming or insinuating, the Second thrown off with all the requisite perkiness and vivacity.
In Children's Corner Trpceski's 'Dr Gradus' is truly modérément and a far cry from a once fashionable virtuoso rush as well as much received French wisdom. His 'Golliwogg' is superbly cantankerous and up-front, though with plenty of sly winks and nudges when required, and in extreme contrast, in 'Et la lune descend sur le temple qui fut' (Images, Bk 2) you will hear an ideally balanced chording and a tonal translucency inseparable from great Debussy-playing.
The end, too (pianissimo and lointain) is memorably evocative. True, there is a momentary loss of focus at the end of 'Poissons d'or' where the final shift of emphasis is blurred, but such tiny lapses are like spots on the sun. Trpceski's way with 'Clair de lune' makes you long to hear him in the complete Suite bergamasque.” Gramophone Classical Music Guide, 2010 “Following his fire-eating Chopin recital, Simon Trpceski retreats into Debussy's more withdrawn poetry and fantasy with an ease and delicacy that suggest, once more, a wholly exceptional artist.” Gramophone Magazine, March 2008 “[Of Images Book II] He [Simon Trpceski] turned ordinary notes into gently shimmering cascades of colour, finally building up to the rollicking, occasionally jazzy ‘Poissons d’or.’ His playing was so perfect that it took an effort to remember to breathe while listening” The Toronto Star | | | In stock - usually despatched within 1 working day. |
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| |  | Debussy - Complete Piano Works Volume 2
“Everything is beautifully phrased, and Pascal Rogé has a fabulous touch, difficult passagework often pouring out of him like a stream of glittering gemstones.” BBC Music Magazine, May 2007 *** “A model of piano recording” Daily Telegraph | | | In stock - usually despatched within 1 working day. |
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| |  | Debussy - Orchestral Works 2
“A great rarity here is Khamma. This and the two Rhapsodies are underrated and, although there are alternative versions of all these pieces, none is more economically priced. The performances are sympathetic and authoritative” Penguin Guide, 2011 edition | | | In stock - usually despatched within 1 working day. |
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Gramophone Awards 2009
Gramophone Magazine
BBC Music Magazine Awards 2009