Performer: Stephen Hough
Format: FLAC (tracks)
Label: Hyperion
Catalogue: CDA67565
Release: 2006
Size: 181 MB
Recovery: +3%
Scan: yes
01. Soler: Sonata in F sharp major, Rubio Ed. No 90
02. Granados: Valses poéticos
Albéniz: Iberia, books 1-4
03. Book 1 No 1. Evocación
04. Book 2 No 3. Triana
Mompou: Impresiones Intimas
05. V. Pájaro triste
06. VI. La barca
07. VIII. Secreto
08. IX. Gitano
09. Longas: Aragón
Debussy: Estampes
10. II. La soirée dans Grenade
Debussy: Préludes – Book 1
11. IX. La sérénade interrompue: Modérément animé
Debussy: Préludes – Book 2
12. III. La Puerta del Vino: Mouvement de Habanera
13. Ravel: Vocalise-étude en forme de habanera
Albéniz: España ‘6 hojas de album’, Op 165
14. II. Tango
Scharwenka: Drei Klavierstücke, Op 63
15. I. Spanisches Ständchen
16. Niemann: Evening in Seville, Op. 55, No. 2
17. Hough: On Falla
Stephen Houghs latest solo album takes us on a colourful tour of Spain and all things Spanish: a kaleidoscope of slants and angles on the soul and character of a once exotic and remote country. Antonio Soler (whose innumerable sonatas were considered sufficiently outlandish to earn him the sobriquet the devil dressed as a monk) sets the scene for a sequence of impressionist wonders by Granados, Albeniz and Mompou (a disc of whose pianistic micro-masterpiecesCDA66963won for Stephen Hough the 1998 Gramophone Instrumental Award), and Federico Longass insinuatingly virtuosic charmer Aragon. Hough then allows outsiders a view into the magical kingdom. Debussy and Ravel peer longingly over the Pyrenees, while Godowsky, Scharwenka, Niemann and finally Hough himself are all in turn unable to resist this richest of cultural experiences. Stephen Houghs esoteric recital CDs rapidly acquire something of a cult status. Classic CD wrote of Stephen Houghs New Piano Album CDA67043: This is a terrific disc. A master pianist reminds us that the piano can delight, surprise and enchant; while Classic FM Magazine welcomed Stephen Houghs English Album CDA67267 saying: Houghs pianism is a constant source of wonderevery chord and phrase perfectly judged.