Debussy

In the first decade of his recording career, cellist Gautier Capuçon has demonstrated great versatility, playing as often as a chamber musician as he has appeared as a concerto soloist. His repertoire covers the standard cello works, though he frequently performs pieces that are less expected. Thus, on this 2014 release from Erato, Capuçon delivers a stirring performance of Franz Schubert's famous Arpeggione Sonata, which is regularly recorded by cellists, yet he fills the rest of the disc with pieces a bit off the beaten path, such as Robert Schumann's Five Pieces in Folk Style, Claude Debussy's Sonata for cello and piano, and Benjamin Britten's Sonata in C.

Between 1965 and 1967 Benjamin Britten and Sviatoslav Richter teamed up at the Aldeburgh Festival for piano duo programs that were taped by the BBC for future broadcast. Music and Arts brought out this material on several CD issues, which stemmed from excellent tape sources. The selections on Decca's "official" release sound marginally fuller with less tape hiss. Do the performances live up to their legend? In most ways, yes. The dream team understates the theme of Schubert's ravishing Andantino Varié, yet opens up more as the four variations effortlessly segue from one to the next.

This generously programmed disc provides excellent value and outstanding performances of both major and lesser-known masterpieces of French choral music. The Fauré Requiem has been recorded many times, and several excellent versions of the original orchestration are available on disc. This one is among them, owing to John Eliot Gardiner's experience and perfectionist mastery of details overlooked by less-successful choral conductors. The real bonus here is the inclusion of the popular but very difficult Debussy and Ravel chansons, and the rarely heard but eminently worthy little part songs by Saint-Saëns. These pieces are a lesson in how to achieve maximum effect with the simplest materials.

Live Classics’ Natalia Gutman “Portrait” series continues with a second volume documenting the cellist’s work from her early career up to the present. A 1967 German radio broadcast of the Debussy Cello Sonata stands out for Gutman’s warm, expansive tone and strong, fluid support from pianist Alexei Nassedkin. A few moments of uncertain intonation and less-than-centered articulation in the second movement’s opening pizzicatos are a small price to pay for fine overall ensemble values. Gutman shines in the declamatory, slow-motion passages that dominate the outer movements of Schnittke’s First Cello Sonata, and throws herself head first into the central Presto’s roller-coaster arpeggios and ruthless clusters. A gripping performance, this: every bit as authoritative as Alexander Ivashkin’s with the composer’s widow Irina Scnittke at the piano. She’s a more sensitive colorist than Gutman’s solid yet comparatively monochrome Vassily Lobanov.

Among modern recordings of the opera, this one is a safe bet, assuming you want a safe version of this opera. Unlike Herbert von Karajan's oppressively string-heavy reading with the Berlin Philharmonic on EMI, this is a balanced, idiomatic account of the score, given a special luster by the Montreal Symphony Orchestra's coloristic instincts and the warm recording acoustic at St. Eustache Church. Conductor Charles Dutoit has a fine instinctive feel for Debussy in general and this score in particular. The singers in the title roles–Didier Henry and Colette Alloit-Lugaz–have both come to terms with the opera's enigmatic dramaturgy. However, it's very much a symphonic rather than operatic performance, clearly a product of the recording studio rather than of the stage.

This stunning and generous collection belongs right at the top of the heap in its respective repertoire. The Debussy is still a comparative rarity in concert if not on disc, a remarkable fact given that it's wholly gorgeous from first note to last. Jean-Efflam Bavouzet's excellence as a Debussy pianist already has been acknowledged by just about everyone who has heard him, and needs no further advertisement here. The performance is outstanding, sensitive to every nuance, but also very French in its clear-eyed sensibility and understanding that focused rhythm and supple tempos prevent the music from turning excessively sentimental or blandly pretty. And in Tortelier, Bavouzet has a conductor who seconds him every step of the way. A similar sensibility informs these swift, razor-sharp, and utterly thrilling accounts of the two Ravel concertos. That for the left hand seldom has sounded so exciting, or in its jazzy central march section, so sinister. Listen to the bite that both soloist and orchestra bring to that descending scale theme, and notice the way Bavouzet shapes his cadenza so as to preserve the illusion of multiple parts played by multiple hands–all without slowing down at the tough passages. It's really an amazing performance by any standard. Even the dark opening, often merely murky on other recordings, has shape and urgency, the buildup to the initial entry of the piano creating incredible tension.

The second release from Katia and Marielle Labèque's own KML label largely revisits Debussy and Stravinsky works that the duo previously essayed for Philips. Their newer versions are preferable, and may well represent the Labèque sisters' finest recordings to date. Whereas a driving, steel-edged literalism characterizes their earlier Debussy En blanc et noir, the duo now imbues the score with greater rhythmic leeway.

Pianist Alice Sara Ott releases Nightfall, an album that explores the transition and harmony between day and night, light and darkness. This recording features a collection of evocative pieces by Satie, Debussy, and Ravel, including Debussy's "Clair de lune" and Ravel's Gaspard de la nuit - all played with Ott's velvet touch and soulful depth.

The Seduction of Claude Debussy is a 1999 concept album by Art of Noise, featuring a line-up of Trevor Horn, Anne Dudley, Paul Morley, and Lol Creme. Also appearing on the album are John Hurt, soprano Sally Bradshaw, Rakim, and Donna Lewis. The group blended the music of French impressionist composer Claude Debussy with drum and bass, opera, hip hop, jazz, and narration, and described the album as "the soundtrack to a film that wasn't made about the life of Claude Debussy.