Composer: Gioacchino Antonio Rossini
Performer: Alessandro Marangoni
Number of Discs: 2
Format: FLAC (tracks)
Label: Naxos
Catalogue: 8570590-91
Release: 2008
Size: 377 MB
Recovery: +3%
Scan: yes
CD 01
Péchés de vieillesse, Vol. 7, Album de chaumiere
01. No. 1, Gymnastique d’ecartement
02. No. 2, Prelude fugasse
03. No. 3, Petite polka chinoise
04. No. 4, Petite valse de boudoir
05. No. 5, Prelude inoffensif
06. No. 6, Petite valse, “L’huile de Ricin”
07. No. 7, Un profond sommeil –
08. No. 7, Un reveil en sursaut
CD 02
Péchés de vieillesse, Vol. 7, Album de chaumiere
01. No. 8, Plein chant chinois
02. No. 9, Un cauchemar
03. No. 10, Valse boiteuse
04. No. 11, Une pensee a Florence
05. No. 12, Marche
Péchés de vieillesse, vol. 9, Album pour piano, violon, violoncelle, harmonium et cor
06. No. 1, Melodie candide
07. No. 3, La savoie aimante
08. No. 2, Chansonette
09. No. 5, Impromptu tarantellise
When Rossini drew a line under his own hugely successful operatic career at the age of 37, he spent his final years in Paris where he wrote numerous short piano pieces arranged in 14 volumes, which he jokingly called Péchés de vieillesse (Sins of Old Age): experimental trifles which blur the boundaries between the irreverent and the serious.
Volume VII, ‘Album de chaumière’ (The Cottage Album) includes gems such as the delightful Petite polka chinoise, the intimate and touching Petite valse de boudoir and the decidedly reassuring Prélude inoffensif.
The recording is rounded off with four solo piano pieces from Volume IX of the Péchés, whose titles, like those of the other works on this disc, are playfully deceptive.