Composer: Claude Debussy
Performer: Alexei Lubimov
Number of Discs: 2
Format: FLAC (tracks)
Label: Melodiya
Catalogue: MEL CD 1002002
Release: 1971/2012
Size: 354 MB
Recovery: +3%
Scan: cover
CD 01
Préludes, Livre 1, L. 117
01. I. Danseuses de Delphes
02. II. Voiles
03. III. Le vent dans la plaine
04. IV. Les sons et les parfums tournent dans l’air du soir
05. V. Les collines d’Anacapri
06. VI. Des pas sur la neige
07. VII. Ce qu’a vu le vent d’ouest
08. VIII. La fille aux cheveux de lin
09. IX. La sérénade interrompue
10. X. La cathédrale engloutie
11. XI. La danse de Puck
12. XII. Minstrels
13. D’un cahier d’esquisses, L. 99
14. L’Isle joyeuse, L. 106
CD 02
Préludes, Livre 2, L. 123
01. I. Brouillards
02. II. Feuilles mortes
03. III. La puerta del Vino
04. IV. Les fées sont d’exquises danseuses
05. V. Bruyères
06. VI. Général Lavine – eccentric
07. VII. La terrasse des audiences du clair de lune
08. VIII. Ondine
09. IX. Hommage à S. Pickwick Esq. P.P.M.P.C.
10. X. Canope
11. XI. Les tierces alternées
12. XII. Feux d’artifice
13. Hommage à Haydn, L. 115
14. Berceuse héroïque, L. 132
Two books of Debussy’s piano preludes were composed in 1910 and 1913, respectively. Unlike similar opuses by Chopin, Rachmaninoff, Scriabin and others, they had no tonal sequence, and each piece was conceived as an individual work. In whole, the cycle is a sort of concise encyclopedia of the great French composer’s music with its fanciful and sophisticated, but so imperceptibly attractive combination of romanticism and impressionism, centuries-old traditions of piano music and cultural paradoxes of the 20th century. The titles Debussy gave to each of the preludes (they are sooner poetic metaphors) are put in the end rather than in the beginning of the notes and not intended to impose a certain character on the listener. Instead, they seem to ask riddles as if they check whether the mood of a piece is caught correctly.
Debussy’s preludes found a fine and thoughtful interpreter in the person of Alexei Lyubimov.
A graduate of the Moscow Conservatory where he studied with Heinrich Neuhaus, from the very first steps of his artistic career the pianist was not only inclined to unconventional performing solutions and actively collaborated with modern authors, but also showed a great interest in playing long-forgotten music and was one of the first musicians to learn authentic instruments of the clavier family (harpsichord, hammer clavier, etc). Lyubimov was the first Soviet pianist who recorded Debussy’s piano preludes.