Alexandre Tharaud - Versailles on CD

Description

Who but Alexandre Tharaud would follow an album devoted to Beethoven’s formidable final three piano sonatas with a recital of compact pieces by Lully, Rameau, François Couperin and other composers associated with the French court in the 17th and 18th centuries? “I’ve always been attracted by French music of this period,” explains Tharaud, whose wide-ranging Erato catalogue embraces Bach, Scarlatti, Haydn, Mozart, Chopin, Brahms, Rachmaninov, Satie, the music of Jazz Age Paris and the work of French singer-songwriter Barbara. “I see this album as a bouquet of short pieces by different composers of that time. It is a tribute to the composers of Versailles.” They were active during the reigns of Louis XIV, Louis XV and Louis XVI and the youngest of them, Claude Balbastre, died in 1799, 10 years after the outbreak of the French Revolution. A number of the pieces have not, to the best of Tharaud’s knowledge, previously been recorded on the modern piano – he mentions the music of Balbastre, Jacques Duphly and Pancrace Royer. As he explains, Lully did not write for solo keyboard, but his orchestral Marche pour la cérémonie des Turcs from Le bourgeois gentilhomme has been transcribed for piano a number of times. For this album Tharaud has made his own arrangement of the piece, aiming to capture the full richness of its sonorities and to emphasise its dancing nature. Some of the pieces Tharaud considered for inclusion felt immediately comfortable on the piano keyboard; others sounded cumbersome and thus unsuitable for the album. For instance, the highly ornamented writing of Jean-Henry d’Anglebert (1629-1691) can be tricky on the modern instrument, which has a heavier action and sonority than a 17th century harpsichord. That being said, one of the five works by d’Anglebert that Tharaud selected was originally written for organ (the Fugue grave), and he points out that Rameau sometimes conceived his keyboard music in orchestral terms, going on to arrange certain keyboard pieces for orchestra. Tharaud launches the programme with a work he describes as “an absolute masterpiece”, the Prelude that opens Rameau’s first book of keyboard pieces. “It’s like being alone at Versailles, opening the doors and entering those huge, imposing rooms. The music starts off with a first section of disarming, contemplative simplicity and then it moves into a clearly defined prelude that Bach could have written. In a sense it sums up the entire programme in just a couple of minutes.”

Tracklist:

Prélude
Le Rappel Des Oiseaux
Sarabande
Tambourin
L'aimable
Gavotte Et Doubles
Sarabande 'Dieu Des Enfers'
La Marche Des Scythes
Viens, Hymen
Premier Et Deuxième Tambourins
Les Ombres Errantes
La Pothouïn
Les Sauvages
Chaconne
Ouverture De Cadmus
Passacaille
Fugue Grave
La De Belombre
Marche Pour La Cérémonie Des Turcs
La Suzanne
Variations Sur Les Folies D'Espagne