Resonances: Works by Bartók / Berg / Liszt / Mozart Hélène Grimaud

• Piano Sonata No. 8 in A minor K. 310 (300d) a-moll · en la mineur
• 1Allegro maestoso07:54
• 2Andante cantabile con espressione10:21
• 3Presto02:55
• Piano Sonata, Op.1
• 4Mässig bewegt - Langsames Tempo - Quasi Adagio11:36
• Piano Sonata in B minor S 178 h-moll · en si mineur
• 5Lento assai - Allegro energico - Grandioso - Recitativo - Andante sostenuto - Quasi Adagio - Allegro energico - Più mosso - Stretta quasi Presto - Presto-Prestissimo - Andante sostenuto - Allegro moderato - Lento assai30:12
• 6 Roumanian Folk Dances, BB 68, Sz. 56
• 6Stick Dance01:08
• 7Sash Dance00:28
• 8Stamping Dance01:05
• 9Dance of Buchum01:22
• 10Roumanian Polka00:29
• 11Fast Dance00:59
• Total Runtime01:08:29

Info for Resonances: Works by Bartók / Berg / Liszt / Mozart

After a brief absence from the concert platform, Hélène Grimaud is back and presenting a brand new solo recital programme, which she will take on a world-wide tour during the upcoming concert season.

The pianist has conceived another programme of works spanning a wide range of emotions and styles, yet all linked by their origin in that singular musical line of succession: the great composers of the Austro-Hungarian empire. Her new album bears the title Résonance, reflecting Grimaud’s imaginative approach to this stimulating compilation of masterpieces.

Hélène Grimaud brings all her artistic maturity and a perfect balance between intellect and emotion to bear on highly dramatic sonatas by Mozart – the A minor K.310 – Liszt and Berg, leavened by Bartók’s irresistible Romanian Folk Dances.

For Grimaud the keystone here is Alban Berg’s hyper-charged, ultra-romantic Opus 1. In this highly concentrated work, the fascinating interrelationships, resonances, between the composers and pieces are summarized and condensed. “This is a music drama in the miniature form of a single-movement sonata,” comments Grimaud, “a maximum of expression that seems to emanate directly from the heart – contained within a piece of incredibly clear structure.”

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Review:
The programme for Hélène Grimaud's recital was identical to that of Resonances, her latest album – a typically quirky compendium of works broadly linked to the idea of Austria-Hungary, and assembled so we notice the cross-references, intentional or otherwise, between them. The Berg and Liszt Sonatas, both in B Minor and taking us to hell and back in a single movement, were flanked by Mozart's A minor Sonata K310 and Bartók's Romanian Folk Dances. All four works share qualities of structural compression, while repeated rhythmic monotones are important in everything but the Berg.

Grimaud is a risk-taker, and you have to accept that the insights sometimes come at the price of flaws. As with any major interpretation of the Liszt, there was a sense of a battle won in overcoming the Sonata's technical difficulties. In the fugue, above all, she achieved a sense of recklessness that was at once thrilling and unique. But when Liszt elsewhere relaxes the strenuosity, Grimaud relaxed the momentum and lost her sharpness of emotional focus. The Mozart, meanwhile, was a rough-hewn thing of gnarled and knotty tensions played with a ferocity that would make any period purist run screaming for cover.

The Berg and Bartók brought greater homogeneity. Her ruthless exposure of Berg's passions and tangled harmonies was exceptional. Bartók's Dances, meanwhile, became intense, fragmented vignettes that first roused feelings, then left the listener hanging in emotional mid-air. The one encore, a transcription of the Dance of the Blessed Spirits from Gluck's Orfeo ed Euridice, was calm and exquisite after all the turmoil. (Tim Ashley, The Guardian)

Hélène Grimaud, Piano

Recording: Berlin, Rundfunk-Zentrum, 9/2010
Executive Producer: Ute Fesquet
Producer: Sid McLauchlan
Recording Engineer (Tonmeister): Daniel Kemper
Project Coordinator: Matthias Spindler
Piano Technician: Serge Poulain

Hélène Grimaud - Pianist
A truly multi-faceted and charismatic artist – for pianist Hélène Grimaud music is a limitless passion. Hélène regularly appears with the most important orchestras in the world, playing with the Berliner Philharmoniker, Symphonieorchester des Bayerischen Rundfunks, Philharmonia Orchestra and Münchner Philharmoniker, as well as all the great orchestras in North America. She has performed with three generations of conductors, including Kurt Masur, Bernard Haitink, Esa-Pekka Salonen, Neeme Järvi, Pierre Boulez, Ricardo Chailly, Valery Gergiev, Vladimir Jurowski, Fabio Luisi and Andris Nelsons. She was soloist at the Last Night of the BBC Proms 2008.

An ardent and committed chamber musician, Hélène Grimaud performs regularly in the most prestigious festivals and cultural capitals with a wide range of collaborators including Thomas Quasthoff, Rolando Villazòn, Jan Vogler, Truls Mørk, Clemens Hagen and the Capuçon brothers. In 2009 she performed hugely successful debut recitals in China and Korea and further concerts in Europe. In 2010 she appeared as Artiste Etoile in four concerts at the Lucerne Festival. An international recital tour encompassing Europe, USA and Japan dominated her 2010/11 season with repertoire ranging from Mozart to Bartòk. In between recitals Hélène Grimaud has performed regularly in concert throughout the season – in Moscow with Myung-Whun Chung and the Orchestre Philharmonique de Radio France, in St Petersburg with Valery Gergiev and the Kirov Orchestra, in Beijing with David Zinman and the China National Symphony Orchestra, in Germany with the Munich Philharmonic and Christian Thielemann and in the States with both the San Francisco Symphony and Philadelphia Orchestras. This summer she appears at leading European festivals including Beethovenfest Bonn and the London Proms.

Highlights of this autumn include a European tour with the Orchestra of the Accademia di Santa Cecilia and Antonio Pappano, a week-long Paris residency in November entitled Domaine Privé and a further Paris concert with the London Symphony Orchestra and Valery Gergiev. In March 2012 Hélène Grimaud returns to perform with the Vienna Philharmonic for concerts with Yannick Nézet-Séguin and in April she joins the Bavarian Radio Symphony Orchestra and Andris Nelsons for performances in Munich.

An exclusive Deutsche Grammophon artist since 2002, Hélène is one of DG’s most important recording artists with a string of imaginative and highly successful discs. This autumn she releases her debut of Mozart ‘s Piano Concertos No.19 and No.23 with Kammerorchester des Bayerischen Rundfunks, the disc also features a collaboration with singer Mojca Erdmann on a recording of Mozart’s ’Ch’io mi scordi di te? KV 505’. Her most recent release, Resonances, features music by Mozart, Berg, Liszt and Bartok. Previous DG recordings include Bach’s solo and concerto works in which she directed Die Deutsche Kammerphilharmonie Bremen from the keyboard, and a Beethoven disc with Staatskapelle Dresden and Vladimir Jurowski, ‘Reflection’ and ‘Credo’ (both of which feature a number of works linked thematically), and a Chopin and Rachmaninov Sonatas disc. Hélène also features on two recent DVD releases: 2010 ECHO Klassik award winning DVD of Rachmaninov’s Second Piano Concerto with Claudio Abbado and the Lucerne Festival Orchestra, and Ravel’s Piano Concerto in G major with Vladimir Jurowski and the Chamber Orchestra of Europe.

Recipient of numerous awards worldwide, in 2009 Hélène Grimaud received the Musikfest Bremen Award. She has been appointed ‘Officier dans l’ordre des Arts et des Lettres’ by the French Ministère de la Culture in 2002 and ‘Chevalier dans l’Ordre National du Mérite’ in 2008. In 2004 she received a ‘Victoire d’honneur’ at the Victoires de la Musique and in 2005 she won the ECHO ‘Instrumentalist of the Year’ Award. Author of two very successful books, “Variations Sauvages” and “Leçons Particulières”, she champions many charitable causes, including the Wolf Conservation Center which she founded in upper New York State in 1999, the International Children’s Camp Villa San Souci, the Worldwide Fund for Nature and Amnesty International.

Date Last Edited: 30th September 2011

This album contains no booklet.