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See Terms & Conditions for p&p rates. | |  | Couperin - Works for Harpsichord - Volume 1
Born in 1964 the French harpsichordist, Pierre Hantaï, gave his first concerts at an early age, alone or with his brothers Marc and Jérôme. He then spent two years studying in Amsterdam with Gustav Leonhardt, who subsequently invited him to perform under his direction. In 1983 Hantaï scored his first major triumph through taking first prize at the International Bach-Handel Competition of Bruges in Belgium; since then, Hantaï has collected an impressive number of honours and awards. “…the selection provides variety and an opportunity to really hear the full range of the instrument. Some may find some of the pointing in the moderately paced pieces a little precious, but these are for the most part persuasive and winning performances.” BBC Music Magazine, January 2008 **** | | | In stock - usually despatched within 1 working day. |
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| |  | Couperin - Tic Toc Choc & other pieces
"I wanted to focus this programme on the idea of play. Centring on Le Tic-Toc-Choc, which I often use as an encore, I gathered together Couperin's most 'pianistic' pieces, underlining the playful aspect… I have a particularly soft spot for Duphly's La Pothoïn, which for me is one of the loveliest pieces ever composed for keyboard. I think this music, written later than Couperin's, provides an ideal link between the harpsichord and the arrival of the fortepiano, which Duphly couldn't bring himself to adopt. All through these sessions, shut up in the immense hall at IRCAM, I thought of a number of artists who have long been part of my life and a source of inspiration for me, that whole family of pianists who handed this repertoire down to us: Louis Diémer, Marcelle Meyer, Robert Casadesus, Emil Gilels,Yvonne Lefébure, Pierre Barbizet . .They were omnipresent in my mind.This recording is my tribute to them." Alexandre Tharaud “…while Tharaud's ornamentation is impeccable and the piano well recorded, the collection as a whole is disappointingly monochrome.” BBC Music Magazine, December 2007 “Alexandre Tharaud's disc of Rameau keyboard works was a refreshing demonstration that French harpsichord music can be convincingly transferred to the piano, twiddles and all, if its essential character is respected and understood.
Now he attempts the seemingly tougher task of doing the same for the more delicate Couperin, and again emerges with honour. Reactions to a disc like this can only be personal, but Tharaud's unapologetically pianistic approach not only yields highly attractive results but also gets closer to Couperin's true spirit.
Mind you, he only chooses works that he considers suitable to the piano, selecting from right across Couperin's output rather than playing whole suites. Arguably, he gets it wrong only twice, in La visionnaire and the great B minor Passacaille, fulsome formal pieces both, whose grandeur the piano somehow manages to dull.
Yet for the most part the music sounds beautifully at home. Poetic wonders such as La museplantine, Les ombres errantes and the iconic Lesbaricades mistérieuses are played with tender sensitivity of mind and touch, while Le carillon deCithére is a glistening vision of a Watteauesque paradise. Elsewhere, Le tic-toc-choc and Les toursde passe-passe are enlivened by off-beat accents, Bruit de guerre thrills with its added drum part, and Muséte de taverni, multi-tracked into a work à 5 mains, rattles away like some delicious missing movement from L'arlésienne. Tharaud closes with a piece by Duphly, relishing its dark melancholy and, not for the first time on this disc, evoking another great keyboard poet, Robert Schumann. This is a release which successfully recognises and celebrates Couperin's genius, and you cannot ask for much more than that.” Gramophone Classical Music Guide, 2010 “Reactions to a disc like this can only be personal, but mine are that, compared to the more "correct" but less colourful Angela Hewitt… Tharaud's unapologetically pianistic approach not only yields highly attractive results but also gets closer to the Couperin's true spirit. Poetic wonders such as La muse plantine, Les ombres errantes and the iconic Les baricades mistérieuses are played with tender sensitivity of mind and touch, while Le carillon de Cithére is a glistening vision of a Watteauesque paradise. Tharaud closes with a piece by Duphly, relishing its dark melancholy and, not for the first time on this disc, evoking another great keyboard poet, Robert Schumann.” Gramophone Magazine, June 2007 “If you doubt that a concert grand can be as sparkling as a harpsichord listen to Akexandre Tharaud and his selection of 20 Couperin jewels. Try his way with Le Carillon de Clithére and you will never want to hear a
harpsichord again. Sleek presentation, clever sleeve notes and high-end sound make this the most beautifully packaged of all the collected releases here.” Pianist Magazine, June-July 2007 | | | In stock - usually despatched within 1 working day. |
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| |  | Couperin - Piéces de Clavecin
French harpsichordist Olivier Baumont has distinguished himself as a performer and scholar, specializing in French Baroque repertoire. He took up the harpsichord without learning piano first, sharing his family's love for French history of the seventeenth and eighteenth centuries. He studied with Kenneth Gilbert and Huguette Dreyfus and worked with Gustav Leonhardt in his master classes in Cologne. He was awarded first prize in harpsichord (1981) and in chamber music (1982) at the Paris Conservatory and won the Concours de Solistes de Radio France in 1982. He frequently performs at music festivals in Europe, England, and the United States, and has toured widely. Since 1992, he has directed the Festival Couperin at Chaumes-en-Brie. In September, 2001, Baumont became professor of harpsichord at the Paris Conservatory. He is the author of a biography of François Couperin, has edited harpsichord works by Michel Corrette and Jacques Duphly, and has contributed scholarly articles to numerous musicological journals. “Selected harpsichord pieces from four collections played on no less than nine different harpsichords. Stylishly played, though sound is rather dry.” BBC Music Magazine, January 2010 **** | | | Usually despatched in 4 - 5 working days. |
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| |  | David Russell - Air on a G StringBaroque Guitar Masterpieces
Air on a G String brings together works by Jacques de Saint-Luc and Silvius Leopold Weiss, two of the master lutenists of the late 17th and early 18th centuries, as well as Russell’s own transcriptions for guitar of compositions by Johann Sebastian Bach and François Couperin. Silvius Leopold Weiss, born in Breslau (now Wroclaw, Poland) in 1686, was the most renowned member of Germany’s leading family of lutenists during the time of Johann Sebastian Bach. Weiss wrote well over eight hundred pieces for lute – more than any other composer – including some sixty solo “sonatas”. The Flemish lutenist and composer Jacques de Saint-Luc was born in 1616 in Ath, twenty miles southwest of Brussels and not far from Belgium’s present-day border with France. Couperin’s Les Silvains (The Woodland Fauns, Book I of Pièces de Clavecin [1713], Ordre 1, No. 8) is one of his earliest keyboard works of the pastoralism that figured so prominently in 18th-century French art. Tours de Passe-Passe (Book IV [1730], Ordre 22, No. 8) is a French colloquialism for “legerdemain” or “sleight-of-hand,” and in Couperin’s playfully effervescent piece indicates the crossing of hands at the keyboard." “Throughout this fine recital, Russell evokes the sound of lute and harpsichord without ignoring the additional technical and colouristic opportunities afforded him by a modern guitar. …another outstanding release by this incomparable guitarist.” Gramophone Magazine, August 2008 | | | Usually despatched in 4 - 5 working days. |
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| |  | Couperin: Harpsichord Works
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| |  | Alexandre Tharaud: Baroque
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