Eric Le Sage

For the fourth and penultimate volume of his Fauré series, Eric Le Sage has been joined by Alexandre Tharaud, Emmanuel Pahud, and François Salque, long-standing accomplices, in order to record these pieces for four hands. Recipient of numerous prizes both in France and abroad, this complete Fauré series is already asserting itself as a reference for the interpretation of Gabriel Fauré’s chamber music with piano.

In a genre set by Boccherini, represented in the 19th century by the masterpieces of Schumann, Brahms, and Franck, Gabriel Fauré composed two scores that were very different from his early romances and the evanescent lullaby of death that is the Requiem. The Piano Quintet Op. 89 remains little known for reasons related to its composition as much as its history.

In a genre set by Boccherini, represented in the 19th century by the masterpieces of Schumann, Brahms, and Franck, Gabriel Fauré composed two scores that were very different from his early romances and the evanescent “lullaby of death” that is the Requiem. The Piano Quintet Op. 89 remains little known for reasons related to its composition as much as its history. Regarded by Koechlin as one of Fauré’s finest works, it serves as a transition to the composer’s final stylistic period. The Piano Quintet No. 2, Op. 115, surprisingly less melancholy than its predecessor, is one of the composer’s last productions. In the evening of his life, Fauré demonstrated his supreme mastery and prodigious creative power, giving French chamber music one of its finest monuments.

Je n'aime pas le classique mais çà j'aime bien
RCA | 30 juin 2008 | Classical | APE+CUE | 3% Recovery | 2CDs | 797 MB | Covers

Dans un coffret long-box collector, illustré par Sempé, voici le produit idéal pour se lancer “sur un autre ton” dans la musique classique !
“Je n’aime pas le classique, mais ça j’aime bien”, n’est-ce pas la réponse type du néophyte positivement surpris par un air classique qui le séduit, mais se gardant bien de s’avouer totalement vaincu par un genre musical tout entier avec lequel il est moins affolant et fatiguant de prendre ses distances… ? Le coffret contient une compilation classique idéale, en 2CD, réunissant 45 titres vraiment marquants, courts, imparables, avec un grand son, et très bien défendus par les artistes prestigieux de nos catalogues. Le coffret contient en plus un livre de dessins de Sempé “Les musiciens”, offrant un autre regard – provocateur et finement ironique – sur la musique et les musiciens, pour que la fête soit complète et non rébarbative.

Alexandre Tharaud has always defied categorization—a rare musician who dazzles equally in J.S. Bach as he does in The Beach Boys, and everything in between. Pieced together from recordings made over 30 years, this collection finds Tharaud steering us on a four-hour journey through some of the piano’s greatest solo works, thrilling and beautiful concerto movements, and an array of ravishing discoveries including the charming, post-Impressionist worlds of French composers Paul Le Flem and Jean Wiener. Elsewhere, the variety on display is breathtaking, the programming daring as Tharaud moves seamlessly from Satie to Bach, Fauré to Gershwin, even Morricone to Poulenc. It’s a bold move to place Debussy’s sumptuous “Prélude à l’après-midi d’un faune” after the crispness of Mozart’s “Alla Turca", for instance, but the contrast is spellbinding—as is every moment of this extraordinary piano treasury.