Ravel: Complete Works for Solo Piano

Ravel: Complete Works for Solo Piano

Ravel: Complete Works for Solo Piano
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CD Details

Composer: Maurice Ravel
Performer: Jean-Philippe Collard
Edition: Music CD
CD Release Date: 2005-02-15
Music Label: EMI Classics
Soundtracks:
Music CD 1
  1. Serenade Grotesque
  2. Menuet Antique
  3. Pavane Pour Une Infante Defunte
  4. Jeux D'Eau
  5. 1: Modere
  6. 2: Mouvement De Menuet
  7. 3: Anime
  8. 1: Noctuelles: Tres Leger
  9. 2: Oiseaux Tristes: Tres Lent
  10. 3: Une Barque Sur L'Ocean: D'Un Rythme Souple
  11. 4: Alborada Del Gracioso: Assez Vif
  12. 5: La Vallee Des Cloches: Tres Lent
Music CD 2
  1. 1: Ondine: Lent
  2. 2: Le Gibet: Tres Lent
  3. 3: Scarbo: Modere
  4. Menuet Sur Le Nom D'Haydn
  5. 1: Modere/Tres Franc
  6. 2: Assez Lent (Avec Une Expression Intense)
  7. 3: Modere
  8. 4: Assez Anime
  9. 5: Presque Lent (Dans Un Sentiment Intime)
  10. 6: Vif
  11. 7: Moins Vif
  12. 8: Epilogue: Lent
  13. Prelude
  14. Borodine: Valse/Allegro Giusto
  15. Emmanuel Chabrier (Paraphrase Sur Un Air De Gounod, Faust, Acte 3): Allegretto
  16. 1: Prelude: Vif
  17. 2: Fugue: Allegro Moderato
  18. 3: Forlane: Allegretto
  19. 4: Riguadon: Assez Vif
  20. 5: Menuet: Allegro Moderato
  21. 6: Toccata: Vif

Music reviews of Ravel: Complete Works for Solo Piano

Music Review: Collard Plays Ravel
Rating: 4 Stars

Maurice Ravel's (1875 -- 1937)compositions for solo piano are not extensive, but almost all his works have become part of the standard repertoire. Ravel's piano music fits comfortably on a two-CD compilation. There are many available recordings, but I found this budget-priced reissue by Jean-Philippe Collard is an excellent way to get to know Ravel's piano music. Collard (b. 1948) is a French pianist who is known for his interpretations of French music, especially Saint-Saens and Faure. This CD of Ravel was initially released in 1978 and rereleased in 2005. A review of this CD on answers.com upon its reissue aptly stated that "the playing of Jean-Philippe Collard has a lot to recommend it, particularly in the way it is so naturally expressive. ...Collard's use of dynamics and pedal to color the mood and character of each piece never sounds forced or artificial, nor does he ever sacrifice momentum or expression."

Ravel's piano music is often compared to that of Debussy, but it has its own character. Ravel's piano works are almost always descriptive and programmatic. It has an elegance and a distinct rigor. Ravel drew inspiration from many composers, including his French predecessors Faure and Chabrier and the French baroque clavecinists. Much of his music is notoriously difficult to play. Ravel's harmonies are distinctive and the music often shimmers.

Collard plays this music expressively indeed, capturing the many glissandos, arpeggions, soft moving passages, and intricate pedalling that characterize Ravel's scores. The CD begins with Ravel's youthful short piece, "Serenade grotesque" (1895) and proceeds through "Le Tombeau de Couperin" (1917).

Collard does especially well with Ravel's collection of eight waltzes, "Valses nobles et sentimentales" which owes its inspiration to Schubert's short waltzes but with harmonies that are Ravel's own. This collection begins with a vigorous opening waltz, but the remainder of the collection is largely delicate and restrained. The final waltz called "Epilogue" recapitulates some or the earlier musical material.

My favorite work on this CD was "La Tombeau de Couperin" which Ravel composed as a tribute to his beloved French clavecinists, who frequently wrote "Tombeaux" as elegies. Ravel's work includes three classical dance movements, marked "forlane", "Rigaudon" and "Menuet", a fugue, a prelude, and a famously difficult concluding tocatta. In this music, Ravel celebrates nostalgically the elegance and lightness of a world that is no more -- both the world of the French baroque and the world of six of his friends who died in WW I.

Ravel's "Miroirs" is a harbinger of Twentieth Century music. This piece includes five deeply idiosyncratic and elusive movements describing a flight of night moths, sad birds in a forest, a ship sailing on the ocean and a valley of softly tolling bells. The famous fourth movement, "Alborado de gracioso" is of a different character as Ravel portrays energetically a jester. The movement is in the form of a Spanish dance.

Gaspard de la nuit is another programmatic work, virtuosic and often performed. Ravel set three poems by Aloysius Bertrand which portray a water sprite, a criminal hanging from the gallows -- with a piano part that captures the swing -- and, in a virtuosic movement, the antics of a dwarf named Scarbo.

The short three movement "sonatine" consists of three interrelated movements with Ravel's distinctive harmonies, and a light, elegant texture. This work is Ravel at his most classical.

Those listeners who love Ravel will have their own choice performers of his music. For those listeners without much detailed exposure to this composer, Collard's recording is an excellent place to start.

Robin Friedman

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