Grand Piano Series

Grand Piano is a series devoted to the art of the Reproducing Piano. It presents major performances by the legendary pianists who recorded for the Aeolian Company between 1915 and 1930. The acoustic gramophone rarely attempted major keyboard works. The 78s' restricted sound and duration was acceptable for short virtuoso pieces but little else. In contrast, by 1915, the Aeolian Company's "Duo-Art" was already a highly sophisticated digital recording process. Pianists, well aware of the gramophone's limitations, turned enthusiastically to the reproducing piano. Hofmann, Bauer, Paderewski and Grainger were especially committed, not alone in believing that they had achieved the ultimate recording process. Great pianists joined them in recording their concert repertoire, including much that was never repeated on disc.

Augmented GRAND PIANO delivers a multitude of expressive, contemporary, and abstract piano sounds, beautifully recorded, fused with cutting-edge synthesis, and brought to life with powerful modulation & expression tailor-made for modern composers & producers.

Augmented GRAND PIANO delivers a multitude of expressive, contemporary, and abstract piano sounds, beautifully recorded, fused with cutting-edge synthesis, and brought to life with powerful modulation & expression tailor-made for modern composers & producers.

Selim Palmgren’s piano miniatures were extremely popular during his lifetime and were played by the great virtuosos of the day. The sixth volume in this acclaimed series presents a panorama of Palmgren’s works and includes two of his greatest and most important solo pieces – the suite Ungdom, Op. 28 laced with Impressionist and Finnish folk elements, and the Three Piano Pieces, Op. 54 which includes Raindrops and Moonlight, two of his best-known and most atmospheric works. Also included are Lisztian virtuoso studies, Hungarian evocations, and a beautiful, moving Prélude funèbre that was played at Palmgren’s own funeral. Jouni Somero, Palmgren’s greatest modern exponent, continues his historic survey of piano music by one of Finland’s most respected and admired composers.

Selim Palmgren’s piano miniatures were extremely popular during his lifetime and were played by the great virtuosos of the day. The sixth volume in this acclaimed series presents a panorama of Palmgren’s works and includes two of his greatest and most important solo pieces – the suite Ungdom, Op. 28 laced with Impressionist and Finnish folk elements, and the Three Piano Pieces, Op. 54 which includes Raindrops and Moonlight, two of his best-known and most atmospheric works. Also included are Lisztian virtuoso studies, Hungarian evocations, and a beautiful, moving Prélude funèbre that was played at Palmgren’s own funeral. Jouni Somero, Palmgren’s greatest modern exponent, continues his historic survey of piano music by one of Finland’s most respected and admired composers.

Tibor Harsányi, a student of Zoltán Kodály at the Budapest Conservatory, lived in France from 1923 where he became one of the leading expatriate composers to form the group known as "L’École de Paris". As the 4 Morceaux show, his piano music is notable for its variety of character and genre. The Piano Sonata reveals his enthusiasm for dance rhythms and for joyful lyricism as well as quietly sombre elements, while the Burlesques flirt with jazz. The Piano Suite conjures up a vivid series of atmospheres in a work that is songlike, dissonant and ambient.

Polish composer Alfons Szczerbinski was a Romantic who revered Bach, Haydn and Mozart above all others. Many of his scores were lost during the First World War or destroyed by the composer himself. His most extrovert music exudes the panache and rhythmic brio of Chopin whilst his series of Chansons sans paroles display a flair for harmonic fantasy and melodic beauty reminiscent of Mendelssohn. Giorgio Koukl’s second volume of Szczerbinski’s complete piano music reveals yet more discoveries by this unjustly neglected composer.

Armenian pianist and composer Stephan Elmas was a child prodigy who met Franz Liszt and became closely acquainted with Rubinstein and Massenet. Elmas’s life was darkened by illness and the tragedy of his homeland, but his music reflects the ease and facility of his technique, harking back to the Romanticism of Chopin, Liszt and Schumann, rather than the challenging times in which he lived, and with a quality of craftsmanship that gives his music a magnetic attractiveness.
Mikael Ayrapetyan continues his acclaimed exploration of rediscovered Armenian piano repertoire with the first in this series of Elmas’s complete works for piano.

Polish composer Alfons Szczerbinski was a Romantic who revered Bach, Haydn and Mozart above all others. Many of his scores were lost during the First World War or destroyed by the composer himself. His most extrovert music exudes the panache and rhythmic brio of Chopin whilst his series of Chansons sans paroles display a flair for harmonic fantasy and melodic beauty reminiscent of Mendelssohn. Giorgio Koukl’s second volume of Szczerbinski’s complete piano music reveals yet more discoveries by this unjustly neglected composer.

Selim Palmgren along with his contemporaries Rachmaninov, Glazunov and Sibelius, was invited for a professorship at the Eastman School of Music and was considered the equal of these composers during his day. In Palmgren’s lifetime his music was published and performed widely gaining much popularity and acclaim. Today he is largely forgotten so it is with Jouni Somero’s project to record Palmgren’s complete piano works that we gain a fuller picture of this fascinating composer’s music. From virtuoso concert studies to the remarkable variety in the Ten Pieces, Op. 79, this eighth volume in the series consists almost entirely of world première recordings.