The French Avant Garde of the XX century double album OUT NOW !

The French Avant Garde of the XX century double album 

OUT NOW ! 

LINK TO BUY THE DOUBLE CD

Yes ! It has been released , and this time very fast ! THE cd with my very first recording of a Debussy piece ! 

Well .... i see you might think :"What ? after the recordings he did and with all the other pieces , he is stuck with Debussy?" 

You might be right on this, but ... as a frenchy (or an arogant frog as my lovely friends from Aussie used to call me for fun) Debussy is really an important composer. Also the love of his music came only some years ago, and ... i still remember Maestro Entremont mumbeling after me "loosing time" as he used to say with Liszt & Satie while Debussy was waiting for me ! 

Canope is also a very dear piano piece, as far as i remember, this is the very 1st Debussy piece i teached. 

Also Jean Catoire & Olivier Greif are World Premiere on recording ! 

But .... This is NOT the only thing why the program i play on it is so dear to me. 

In fact, beside Jean Catoire, the other pieces are pieces i have been performing since the very first recitals i did 6 years ago ! (well as you can guess reading this post, no, i am not a prodigee !) 

So let stop the crap , this is the whole program and ... it rocks !! On bold, the pieces i am perfoming ! 

Tracklist:

Disc 1:

1. Claude Debussy Canope (1909)

2. Erik Satie Trois morceaux en forme de poire (1903)

3. Guillaume Apollinaire Le Pont Mirabeau (1913)

4. Marcel Duchamp Musical Erratum (1913)

5. Georges Ribemont-Dessaignes Le Nombril interlope (1920)

6. Jean (Hans) Arp Strassburgkonfiguration (1931)

7. Francis Picabia La Nourrice américaine (1920)

8. Arthur Honegger Pacific 231 (1923)

9. Jean Cocteau Les Voleurs d'Enfants (1929)

10. Robert Desnos Relation d'un rêve (1938)

11-16. L'Album des Six (1920)

17-20. Dane Rudhyar Tetragram #3 (Rebirth) (1927)

21. Olivier Greif 2nd Hommage à Raymond Roussel (1971)

Disc 2:

1. Olivier Messiaen Cantéyodjayâ (1949)

2-6. Pierre Schaeffer Cinq études de bruits (1948)

7. Pierre Henry La Voile d'Orphée (1953)

8. Edgard Varèse Poème électronique (1958)

9. Pierre Boulez Sonatine, pour flûte et piano (1946)

10. Jean Catoire Opus 145 (1969)

11. Philippe Hersant La lande (2001)

2xCD booklet features archive images and detailed historical notes. Also available as a digital download.

My tacks had been recorded by the fantastic Nikolaos Samaltanos , and ... he did a WONDERFUL job !!!! 

Also ..... to my greatest pleasure, Maestro Philippe HERSANT who received a copy of the cd was really really please with my performance and said : 

"Un grand merci et un grand bravo à vous ! Votre interprétation de la lande, dans ce tempo très lent, presque dilaté, est vraiment impressionnante !"

So ..... poorly translated by me, it would be ! 

A great thank and a great bravo to you! Your rendering of La Lande in this very slow tempo, almost dilated is really impressive ! 

héhé ! Yes it makes my day, as i am a huge fan of the music of Philippe Hersant (he is the very first french alive composer i choose to perform on concert) ! 

Now to make this post more complete and also a bit funny, i share with you some pictures from the recording cession. 

Nothing special you would say, but .... not so much ! 

In fact i have a little gem : 'How i did the Duchamp' 

As you might know, the Duchamp Erratum Music is a Random Piece

Here a little video of me performing it in Italy some years ago. 

I normally don't like the aproach : "i took by random the notes, put on a score and do the concert after" 

Well ... my aproach was more radical : i am writting all the piano 88 keys on 88 little papers, put on a jar and someone during my performance is puttng the papers front of me. 

But .... on recording ..... how to keep the "real random" process ? 

My idea was quite simple : 

I took a "number random generator" on internet : set up for a result of 88 numbers never repeating. 

I set them on 3 huges papers so i can see well the numbers. 

Also on the piano, i put number 1 to 88 , a sicker every 5 number 

After 2 try , Mr Samaltanos got the perfect idea : to add a "light metronome" to make it really perfect , as .... with the piece going on ... even if i kept the same touch, the tempo was not "so much" perfect. 

And .... to add a "last minute" random touch, i changed (at random) the page order 

Now you know all the little secrets about this recording session !