Philip Chiu Voyages

For his latest ATMA Classique recording, horn player Louis-Philippe Marsolais has chosen a selection of chamber music by Clara and Robert Schumann composed for various instruments, some of which have been transcribed for horn. He is joined by pianists Philip Chiu and David Jalbert, and cellists Stéphane Tétreault and Cameron Crozman.

The Japanese-born violinist Ayana Tsuji was 18 years old in May 2016 when she won first prize in the Concours Musical International de Montréal, but you wouldn’t know it from her debut recording. Perversely, for a release intended to celebrate a major new talent, the booklet contains no biographical information about Tsuji, although we do get a photo of her wearing all six of her gold medals and beaming, as well she might.

In August 2022, Australia-based, French born fourth-world music legend Ariel Kalma was invited to participate in BBC Radio 3’s Late Junction series of special collaborations. The program pairs artists who have not previously worked together to create new music cooperatively.

With trickles of piano, synth, and viola, the Los Angeles-based collaborators shape a tranquil vision of a Nordic landscape that feels just beyond the edge of reality.

On June 29th, 2023, Jeremiah Chiu walked into the Vintage Synthesizer Museum (VSM) in Highland Park, Los Angeles, with no plan more specific than “let’s fire this stuff up and see what happens.” Exploring the VSM’s vast collection of classic, rare and staple synthesizers, he would sequence, trigger, and layer the machines together with help from VSM founder/curator Lance Hill.

This is virtuoso playing in the best sense, and only the most churlish listener could fail to respond to it. From the fin-de-siècle decadence of Schulz-Evler’s Arabesque on the Blue Danube, to the more restrained treatments of Bach by Rachmaninoff and Busoni, Chiu finds exactly the right range of sound and approach.

Pierre Amoyal and Frederic Chiu have developed a partnership (apparent in their acclaimed recording of Prokofiev sonatas) that is ingratiatingly balanced and blissfully spontaneous in expression–just savor how Chiu plays the piano's harmonies off violinist Amoyal's sweetly focused but uncloying tone.

Voyages et Rêves est le premier album d’un jeune batteur/percussionniste guadeloupéen au touché recherché et aux visions captivantes. Elevé dans la tradition du gwo-ka par son père, fondateur du groupe Gwakasonné et passeur de ce genre emblématique de la Guadeloupe, Sonny a accompagné aussi bien les cadors de son île (Tanya St-Val) que les ténors du jazz mondial (David Murray, Reggie Washington…).