Search - Maria João Pires :: Chopin

Late, Great Chopin...

Sébastien Melmoth | Hôtel d'Alsace, PARIS | 07/09/2009

(5 out of 5 stars)

"Late, Great Chopin...

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This new concept album ("The Voice of Late-Period Chopin," 1844-49) from the reigning queen of all the Chopinistas, Maria João Pires, is immanently satisfying to both mind and heart.



Her technique is fine as ever; her depth of emotion and artistic insight are even finer still. The phrasing, the accenting, the voicing are extraordinarily perceptive and well executed.

That Pires is a real mensch is obvious from her performance: this is the real deal: it's undissembled; it's wholehearted; it's sincere. It has both gravitas and sensibility; strength and tenderness. These are knowing, full-blooded, umbral readings highlighted throughout with sparkly glints of astute revelations.

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Pires rightly describes the Third Sonata as "a very important work--a door opening on to a new awareness of things on Chopin's part, [a] leap forwards to an entirely new logic."

Frédéric Sounac understands that Pires' realizations seem to "attribute an almost philosophical range to this music--as if it had formed a new relationship with experience and memory by introducing a sort of distance from itself, like an extremely gentile form of irony."

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Pires' robust earth-mother character combined with her equitable technique make this set of the Sonatas, Nocturnes, Mazurkas, and Valses an extremely satisfying programme.

Piano tone and recording ambience excellent.

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Maria João Pires - Chopin · The Nocturnes

Maria Joao Pires ~ Chopin - Concerto for Piano & Orchestra No. 2 (Op. 21), 24 Preludes (Op. 28)

Maria João Pires ~ Chopin - Piano Concerto No, 1 · Fantasie op. 49 · Fantasie-Impromptu op. 66 · Berceuse op. 57 / COE · Krivine

Chopin: 14 Valses

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Beethoven: Complete Violin Sonatas

Grieg - Violin Sonatas / Augustin Dumay · Maria João Pires

Mozart:Sonatas For Piano & Violin

Schubert: Résonances de l'Originaire

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Maria Joao Pires reads freshly the late Chopin

P. Adrian | Arad, Romania | 02/01/2010

(5 out of 5 stars)

"Maria Joao Pires, the most delicate star-pianist of the last decades on the international concert platform, captures the true mood of late Chopin's works in her most recent recordings, a Deutsche Grammophon CD twofer released in 2009 to worldwide acclaim. Her approach - neither showy, nor elegiac - aims to reach the very essence of the scores she interprets, by means of a subtle balance between affect and lucidity. This balance is masterfully exploited so that any sentimental exaggerations or picturesque embellishments are avoided, whereas the view is not demonstrative or didactic at all.



Technically flawless and stylistically beyond any doubt, in Pires' hands opuses like Sonata No.3, Mazurkas opp. 59, 63, 67 & 68, Nocturnes op.62, Waltzes op.64, Polonaise-Fantasy op.61 are far from being dull or even dry, though none of them comes out mawkishly or virtuosity-oriented. No note is outbidden, no required accent is missing, none inner voice lacks its tune. For the odd and special Sonata for cello and piano op.68, Maria Joao is paired by the young Russian cellist Pavel Gomziakov, a rising star musician with empathy and endowment for such music.



Romantic par excellence, all these pieces - and especially their reading here - seem to favour rustling leaves rather than forest's tempest. The murmur prevails over the turmoil, in the benefit of this wonderful music full of premonitions. Playing Chopin is for Maria Joao Pires like chatting - or rather confessing - with an old friend. Both the composer and the interpreter are faithful with one another, since they know that the partner sharing this conversation masters in a supreme manner his/her art. And most importantly, each feels in the same way the need for music-making.



Excellent recorded sound. First class artistry in interpreting Chopin! Highly recommended!

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