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Fountains
Maurice RAVEL (1875–1937) Jeux d’eau (1901) [5:29] Claude DEBUSSY (1862–1918)
Suite Bergamasque (1890 – 1905) [16:36] Maurice RAVEL Pavane pour une infante defunte (1899) [5:29] Miroirs (1905) [27:40] Claude DEBUSSY Les soirs illuminés par l’ardeur du charbon (1917)
[2:16] Pour le Piano (1901) [13:16]
John
Chen (piano)
rec. 18 April 2006, Eugene Goossens Hall, ABC Ultimo Centre,
Sydney, New South Wales, Australia DDD ABC CLASSICS
476 6834 [71:29]
John
Chen was born in Kuala Lumpur in 1986, studied at the University
of Auckland with Rae de Lisle, and in 2004 became the youngest
winner of the Sydney International Piano Competition. Part
of his prize as winner was to give the première
of Roger Smalley’s second Piano Concerto which
was commissioned for him and the Sydney Youth orchestra
by Ars Musica Australis.
This is the
first time I have heard Chen play anything apart from the
Smalley Concerto – the première, a month before this recording was
made, and again a year later, when it was conducted by
James MacMillan – and I am very impressed. A major work
by each composer and an handful of miniatures plus the
delightful Suite Bergamasque makes a very satisfying
programme.
Jeu d’eau is
treated lightly and delicately, the music-box sounds of
the opening are quite lovely and there is a marvelous fluidity
(no pun intended) to Chen’s playing. Debussy’s charming Suite
Bergamasque is very enjoyable. Chen uses the most subtle
rubato throughout and his limpid playing make this more
of a salon piece – which, let’s be honest, it is and that’s
not a criticism – and it works very well. He doesn’t try
to inflate the music into a bigger piece than it is and
he understands the delicacy of the work. The Menuet,
second movement, has a nicely bluff sense of humour and
in the famous Clair de lune (third movement) he
withholds his emotions and the climax is restrained and
ethereal.
The
famous Pavane is given a straight forward performance,
again the emotion is held in check and this makes for a
more stately performance. Miroirs is one of Ravel’s
most important large scale piano works and whilst it might
not have the intense concentration of the, slightly later, Gaspard
de la nuit the composer doesn’t waste a note in the
five pieces which make up the suite. The first three movements
are quiet and meditative, but there’s such variety here – from
the stuttering, yet calmly elusive, Noctuelles (Owl–Moths)
where the birds seem restless, through the singing of the Oiseaux
tristes (sad birds) – Ravel’s favourite amongst these
pieces – to Une barque sur l’océan (a boat on the
ocean), a picture of a fine day at sea – and it’s not until
the fourth piece, the justly famous Alborada del gracioso (Morning
song of the buffoon), that Chen finally allows us to
hear him as the virtuoso he truly is – so far we’ve heard
the virtuoso musician, now we have the virtuoso concert
pianist unleashed. But Chen understands that whilst this
piece has become the staple of all virtuosi it is part
of a bigger piece and he never allows the work to overpower
the music which surrounds it. The final La vallée des cloches (the valley of bells)
brings us back to Ravel the impressionist and to Chen the
poet.
Debussy’s
recently discovered miniature Les soirs illuminés par
l’ardeur du charbon (Evenings lit by glowing coals – the
title comes from Baudelaire’s Les fleurs du mal)
has a rather sad, but yet touching, provenance. In 1917,
suffering from the cancer which was soon to kill him, France
was at war, his daughter was dead, Debussy, the great Musicien
Français wrote
to his coal merchant (!) “You can understand I can’t keep
writing you piano pieces, but we desperately need coal.” If
I thought that I might receive such a delicate utterance
then I might get a few bags of coal in, just in case! Not
a major work by any means and a tragic end to a great life
but poignant, and human, none the less.
Pour
le Piano, which ends this recital, is a superb short
suite of three pieces which includes two fast, and finger
breaking, movements surrounding a delicate Sarabande.
Chen relishes the fast music, the virtuoso again, but
shows his intellect in the middle piece, and with his
marvelously understated rubato makes this dance 5 minutes
to remember.
As
you will have realised, Chen is a fine musician who uses
his technique fully at the service of the composer, indeed,
there is much more Debussy and Ravel here than Chen because
he has not imposed himself between us and the music. The
recording is bright and clear, the piano situated a little
way from the microphone, thus giving a feeling of sitting
in a concert hall a few rows from the stage. The notes
are good, and this is a very enjoyable disk in every way,
and well worth having purely for the marvellous playing
if nothing else!
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