Claude Debussy-PIANO MUSIC (Connoisseur Society 1967)

Today's date allows for a post of solo piano music by four different composers, with music spanning over seventy years.

The modern piano owes much to the sonic and pianistic endeavors of the composer whose death supplies the jumping-off point for the music to follow: Claude Debussy, who died in 1918.
Debussy's exposure to the music of an Indonesian Gamelan Orchestra at the 1889 Paris Universal Exposition was to have an important effect on his writing, and to further influence the music of many of the French composers to come- Including Olivier Messiaen, and subsequently his pupil, Pierre Boulez.

Each of the composers featured here has used the piano in a distinctly personal way.

























Claude Debussy died on this day in 1918, aged 55 years.

From the cover notes (enclosed) by Nat Hentoff:

(...) I remember wondering at the term "impressionism" applied to this music, the music of Debussy. The term did not seem to me to convey the precision, the accuracy of the scenes,sounds and sometimes almost even smalls within the mysterious settings.And then, later, I read a letter he had written: "What I am trying to do is something different- an effect of reality, but what some fools call impressionism, a term that is utterly misapplied especially by the critics who don't hesitate to apply it to Turner, the greatest creator of mysterious effects in the whole world of art". In a way, it can be said of Debussy what was written of Marianne Moore- that he was "a literalist of the imagination."

As for the piano music, which has seemed to me both more precise and more mysterious than his work in any other area, he urged that his interpreters imagine the piano as being without hammers. If that were done, and if the piano were to be transformed into into an instrument that could evoke real toads in imaginary gardens what was needed was an exceptional knowledge of the piano. Required. Edward Lockspeiser pointed out in his book: Debussy was "the closest analysis of touch and vibration of keyboard harmony and figuration, of the immeasurable contrasts in tone and register- in short...an analysis of all the technical resources of an instrument whose very limitations and defects were to be turned by Debussy into newly discovered virtues".

Side One:

a1-Feux D'Artifice
a2-La Cathedrale engloutie
a3-Les Collines D'Anacapri
a4-Les Sons et les Parfumes Tournant Dans L'Air du Soir
a5-La Terrasse des Audiences du Clair de Lune

Side Two:

"Children's Corner" Suite:
b1-Doctor Gradus Ad Parnassum
b2-Jimbo's Lullabye
b3-Serenad for the Doll
b4-Snow Is Dancing
b5-The Little Shepherd
b6-Golliwog's Cake-Walk

b7-Clair De Lune

Ivan Moravec-Piano























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Victoria Looseleaf - Harpnosis

Victoria Looseleaf - Harpnosis

released on LP in 1984

The intent on this album of harp music is to help calm and relax its listeners which it does. It's one of those new-age type recordings that draws from classical music. It is alluring and beautiful. When I spotted a copy of this in the flea market and saw the names Satie and Cage on it, I knew I had to have it.

The liner notes give Looseleaf's bio at the time of the album's release:

Victoria Looseleaf was classically trained in both piano and harp. She earned a bachelor's degree in psychology from the University of California, Berkeley, and then received a master's of fine arts in the performance and literature of the harp from Mills College. She has appeared in chamber music concerts and as a featured soloist in San Francisco, New York, Southern California and Europe. Currently residing in Laguna Beach, Ms. Looseleaf is perfecting the art of harpnosis, a technique she herself originated. Harpnosis, a de-stressing and relaxation practice, combines the most cogent aspects of psychology, analysis, meditation, sensory input and music.

Victoria Looseleaf recorded another album called Beyond Harpnosis (which I am on the lookout for). Then she quit releasing music and went on to do a cable public-access show called The Looseleaf Report that aired only in Los Angeles and New York. It totaled somewhere around 400 episodes and aired from 1987 to 2008. It had some big name celebrities and other interesting personalities as guests. So far, I found only one episode of her show, but it's a good one, an interview of Timothy Leary. Another interesting tidbit is that she wrote a biography of Leonardo Dicaprio whom she says she knows quite well personally.

She is currently writing a blog of the same name as her TV show where she covers the arts as well as contributing articles to The Los Angeles Times, Dance Magazine, among other publications.



Tracklisting:

Side One

1. Premiere Gymnopedie {3:02}
composed by Erik Satie

2. La Fille aux cheveux de lin {2:17}
composed by Claude Debussy

3. Deuxieme Gymnopedie {2:32}
composed by Erik Satie

4. Premiere Arabesque {4:14}
composed by Claude Debussy

5. Troisieme Gymnopedie {2:20}
composed by Erik Satie

6. Clair de lune {5:07}
composed by Claude Debussy

7. Air on a G string {2:48}
composed by Johann Sebastian Bach

Side Two

1. Canon in D {5:29}
composed by Johann Pachelbel

2. Andante {3:55}
composed by Johann Sebastian Bach

3. In a Landscape {11:58}
composed by John Cage

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Musik fur 20 Finger

Vivienne and Dirk Keilhack - Musik fur 20 Finger

LP released in 1977

Info from the liner notes roughly translated from German to English using a free translation website:

The existing work selection offers a cut out of the literature for piano to four hands of our century, beginning with Regers Burlesken from the year 1901 and ending with Werner Heiders "Locomobile" out of the year 1977.
The funf works show a development line of the music of the 20th Jahrrhunderts of the Spatromantik uber the musical impressionism and the Klassizismus to the vanguard after 1945. You are a testimony fur the pluralism of the styles in the past 75 years. All works received here are knew become real 20-Finger-Musik, i.e. it. only by 4 hands with 20 fingers bewaltigt. A preparation fur a player became essential musical aspects beruhren and ware unthinkable. You spiegelin the much wrinkly Moglichkeiten vierhandiger set manners impressively against. (Dirk Keilhack)

About Vivienne und Dirk Keilhack

The pianist Dirk wedge hoe born in Nurnberg encountered its partner coming out of Cardiff/Wales in the study at the university fur music in Munchen. Both wetted here the same musical training in Maria country Hindemith and Rudolf Hindemith. Further teachers were Otto A Graef, Illona Kabos and Hugo Steurer. After the study entschiossen it itself when duo to appear. They constructed themselves in the following years a coarse repertoire on that at present alone in the field of the vierhandigen piano music approximately 80 works of the before classical period to the vanguard umfabt. Since 1972 have played Vivienne and Dirk wedge hoe with coarse Erfoig program fur piano to four hands and fur of 2 pianos as well as as a soloist in orchestra concerts in Germany, France, England, Holland and Sweden. Fur radio and television received erganzten the concert active-ness. A special concern of both pianist is, the extensive and precious literature fur a piano to four hands of the past and Vernachlassigung to entreiben. Zehlreiche zeitgenossische composers wrote fur the duo composition of this work species.


Tracklisting:

Side A

1. Sechs Burlesken op. 58 {11:15}
composed by Max Reger (1901)

2. Six epigraphes antiques {13:22}
composed by Claude Debussy (1914/1915)

Side B

1. Sonate {13:04}
composed by Paul Hindemith (1938)

2. Capriccio {6:07}
composed by Richard Rodney Bennett (1968)

3. Locomobile {5:06}
composed by Werner Heider (1977)

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Images

Georganne Cassat - Images

This is a tape that I found on one of my digs earlier in the year. It's all lovely harp music that are equivalent to impressionist paintings as the liner notes mention. Harpist Georganne Cassat performs "Images", composed by Marcel Tournier, which this composition's suites comprise most of the album. There are three other pieces performed: "Girl with the Flaxen Hair" by Claude Debussy, "Choral" by Marcelle Soulage and "Etude" by Schmidt. I was unable to find out the full name of Schmidt who composed the piece, so if anyone knows, please let me know.

Liner notes about "Images":

MARCEL TOURNIER, one of the most important harpists and composers for harp in the 19th and 20th centuries wrote these brilliant masterpieces during the early part of this century terminating the Fourth Suite in 1932. This is the first recording in their entirety. The titles are exotic and reflect the nature of the music which is in itself extraordinary. Should one close one's eyes one can but imagine the impressionistic paintings the composer so eloquently pens and the harpist so brilliantly displays in a quilted patchwork of exotic symbolism and "panache" designed to tease and seduce and transport the listener to hitherto uncharted musical domains and cultivated elegance.

Tracklisting:

Side A

1. Images 1er Suite: Clair de Lune sur l'Etang du fare {5:01}

2. Images 1er Suite: Au seuil du Temple {1:21}

3. Images 1er Suite: Lolita, la danseuse {2:33}

4. Images 2e Suite: Les enfants a la creche de Noel {2:58}

5. Images 2e Suite: L'etrange Cavalier {3:03}

6. Images 2e Suite: La Marchande de Frivolites {3:30}

7. Images 3e Suite: Les Anesses grises sur la route d' El-Azib {3:58}

8. Images 3e Suite: Danseuse a la fontaine d'Ain-Draham {4:03}

9. Images 3e Suite: Soir de Fete a Sedjenane {3:17}

Side B

10. Images 4e Suite: La voliere magique {4:48}

11. Images 4e Suite: Cloches sous la neige {1:49}

12. Images 4e Suite: La danse du moujik {5:32}

13. Girl with the Flaxen Hair {3:22}

14. Choral {5:59}

15. Etude {2:44}

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Satie - Debussy

Candide CE 31024 - LP, released 197?

Claude Debussy: Chansons de Bilitis (1897)

for speaking voice, two flutes, two harps and celesta

Erik Satie: Socrate (1918)

Part I - Portrait of Socrate

Part II - The Banks of Ilissus

Part III - The Death of Socrate

Marie-Therese Escribano - speaker, Socrate

Michele Bedard - Phedre

Emiko Iijyama - Alcibiade

Gerlinde Lorenz - Phedon

Ensemble "Die Reihe"

Friedrich Cerha - conductor

Two extremely beautiful works, inspired by Ancient Greece, each one amazing in its unique way. Debussy dives deep into mythology, showcasing a playful and serene musicality, complete with Egyptian courtisanes dancing and an invocation of Pan, god of the winds. Some of the melodies also occur in Debussy's "Six Epigrammes Antiques". The poems were written by Pierre Louys.
Satie's symphonic drama, "Socrate", radiates a quietness and plainness that seem to have more in common with Zen than with anything of western tradition. John Cage wrote an adaptation for two pianos in the 50s, and in 1969 he even composed his own "cover version" of it, "Cheap Imitation".

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