Peter Donohoe - Mussorgsky: Pictures at an Exhibition – Messiaen: Cantéyodjayâ – Ravel: Miroirs '2019

Tracks list

Tracklist
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01. Pictures at an Exhibition: Promenade I
02. Pictures at an Exhibition: Gnomus
03. Pictures at an Exhibition: Promenade II
04. Pictures at an Exhibition: The Old Castle
05. Pictures at an Exhibition: Promenade III
06. Pictures at an Exhibition: Tuileries
07. Pictures at an Exhibition: Bydło
08. Pictures at an Exhibition: Promenade IV
09. Pictures at an Exhibition: Ballet of the Unhatched Chicks
10. Pictures at an Exhibition: Samuel Goldberg and Schmuyle
11. Pictures at an Exhibition: Promenade V
12. Pictures at an Exhibition: The Market Place at Limoges
13. Pictures at an Exhibition: Catacombs
14. Pictures at an Exhibition: The Hut on Hen’s Legs of the Baba-Yaga
15. Pictures at an Exhibition: The Great Gate of Kiev
16. Miroirs: Noctuelles
17. Miroirs: Oiseaux tristes
18. Miroirs: Une barque sur l’océan
19. Miroirs: Alborada del gracioso
20. Miroirs: La vallée des cloches
21. Cantéyodjayâ

One of the pinnacles of nineteenth-century pianism, Modest Mussorgsky’s
Pictures at an Exhibition broke new frontiers in its writing for the piano
through its use of ringing bell-like sonorities, dramatic juxtaposition of
registers and dynamics, its approach to resonance, percussive octaves and rapid
hand-alternations, and sheer grandeur of sound. Introducing new ideas about
virtuosity that owe much to orchestral thinking in the ways the full range of
the piano’s tone-colours are explored, this work requires immense stamina
through combining great finger dexterity with unbridled power.

Mussorgsky’s masterpiece is coupled here with works by Ravel and Messiaen
– composers who were indebted to the innovations of their Russian
predecessor.

Miroirs comprises a set of five pieces evoking contrasting moods and pianistic
characters. Far from being Impressionist – a movement with which Ravel
had little real affiliation –the ‘Mirrors’ of the title
suggests more Symbolist associations in that the individual pieces explore
ambiguities between supposed reality and ‘reflected’ simulation.
Ravel was particularly fascinated by a line from Shakespeare’s Julius
Caesar: ‘the eye sees not itself, but by reflection, by some other
things.’

An unusually non-descriptive work for Messiaen, without religious references or
bird- song, Cantéyodjayâ is about musical process and is constructed as a
mosaic-like collage in which a jaunty rhythmic refrain is contrasted with a
multiplicity of contrasting ideas, many of which are re-workings from his
gargantuan Turangalîla-Symphonie.

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