Bertrand Chamayou – Ravel: Complete Works for Solo Piano (2016) [Qobuz FLAC 24bit/96kHz]

For his second release on Erato, Bertrand Chamayou is dedicating two CDs to the complete solo piano music of Ravel. “My style of playing and the way I imagine sound can be largely attributed to Ravel,” says Chamayou. “Recording his music is not just a return to my roots, but also a natural stage in my development.” This new set makes a fitting successor to Chamayou’s debut disc for the label: released in early 2014 and devoted to music by Schubert, it was praised by the Sunday Times as an “affecting, beautifully performed disc,” by Pianist magazine for “playing of intellectual conviction paired with a singing tone of heart-breaking beauty,” and by the Telegraph for “playing that radiates a generous Schubertian spirit, thoughtful in its shaping, structurally cohesive, absorbing in a spectrum of pianism that draws you into the music’s expressive heart.”

Schubert was one of the composers who inspired Ravel – notably in Valses nobles et sentimentales – as was Franz Liszt, whose transcriptions of Schubert songs were a feature of Chamayou’s debut album. His influence is evident in Ravel’s dauntingly virtuosic Gaspard de la nuit and glittering Jeux d’eau. The latter was the first ‘modern’ score that Chamayou saw as a child, and he began to play it at the age of eleven or twelve. The pianist even has a connection to the composer through one of his teachers at the Paris Conservatoire, Jean François Hessier; he was a student of Vlado Perlemuter who was mentored by Ravel himself. “I admire the purity and simplicity of Perlemuter’s approach, which seems in keeping with the famous – and probably exaggerated – statement attributed to the composer: ‘I don’t expect people to interpret me, just to play me.’”

Tracklist:
Maurice Ravel (1875-1937)
01. Jeux d’eau, M. 30
02. Pavane pour une infante défunte, M. 19
03. A la manière de… Chabrier, M. 63
04. Miroirs, M. 43: I. Noctuelles
05. Miroirs, M. 43: II. Oiseaux tristes
06. Miroirs, M. 43: III. Une barque sur l’océan
07. Miroirs, M. 43: IV. Alborada del gracioso
08. Miroirs, M. 43: V. La Vallée des cloches
09. Menuet antique, M. 7
10. Sérénade grotesque, M. 5
11. A la manière de… Borodine, M. 63
12. Valses nobles et sentimentales, M. 61
Alfredo Casella (1883-1947)
13. A la manière de… Ravel, Op.17b, Book 2: No. 4 Almanzor ou le mariage d’Adelaïde
Maurice Ravel
14. Gaspard de la nuit, M. 55: I. Ondine
15. Gaspard de la nuit, M. 55: II. Le Gibet
16. Gaspard de la nuit, M. 55: III. Scarbo
17. Menuet in C-Sharp Minor, M. 42
18. Sonatine, M. 40: I. Modéré
19. Sonatine, M. 40: II. Mouvement de menuet
20. Sonatine, M. 40: III. Animé
21. Prelude in A Minor, M. 65
22. Le Tombeau de Couperin, M. 68: I. Prélude
23. Le Tombeau de Couperin, M. 68: II. Fugue
24. Le Tombeau de Couperin, M. 68: III. Forlane
25. Le Tombeau de Couperin, M. 68: IV. Rigaudon
26. Le Tombeau de Couperin, M. 68: V. Menuet
27. Le Tombeau de Couperin, M. 68: VI. Toccata
28. Menuet sur le nom de Haydn, M. 58
Alexander Ziloti (1863-1945)
29. Kaddisch, Mélodie hébraïque in C Minor