Anne Queffelec

Anne Queffélec attended the Cours Hattemer, a private school. She started playing piano at the age of five. In 1964, she enrolled in the Paris Conservatoire. She won the first prize for piano in 1965 and the first prize for chamber music in 1966. She continued her education with Paul Badura-Skoda and Jörg Demus. She won the first prize at the Munich competition in 1968. Since then she continued her career playing at the international centres.

Anne Queffélec attended the Cours Hattemer, a private school. She started playing piano at the age of five. In 1964, she enrolled in the Paris Conservatoire. She won the first prize for piano in 1965 and the first prize for chamber music in 1966. She continued her education with Paul Badura-Skoda and Jörg Demus. She won the first prize at the Munich competition in 1968. Since then she continued her career playing at the international centres.

“‘When the world stoops around us, when the structures of a civilization are shattered, it is a good thing to revert to what in history does not stoop but, on the contrary, summons up courage, gathers the parted ones, makes peace without hurting.’ Thus speaks Camus on February 2nd, 1956, paying tribute to Mozart on the bicentennial of his birth. ‘When one has really listened to this song, one has traveled all over the world and had a look at all the beings.’ In 2023 more than ever, this song is vital, ‘Such as into Himself at last eternity’ will not change him.” - Anne Queffélec

Tous ces compositeurs se sont plus ou moins bien connus les uns les autres, appréciés réciproquement pour la plupart (avec quelques dédains quand même, Saint-Saëns et Hahn pour Debussy, Debussy pour presque tout le monde… mais on se croisait avec civilité), et pour cet album concocté par Anne Quéffelec – avec la complicité de son fils Gaspard Dehaene dans quelques ouvrages à quatre mains –, le choix s’est arrêté sur le point commun qui relie tous ces ouvrages : la danse (et la France, hormis Mompou placé comme en exergue au début de l’album).

“The inexpressible depth of all music, by virtue of which it floats past us as a paradise quite familiar and yet eternally remote, is so easy to understand and yet so inexplicable.” This quote by Schopenhauer evokes the mystery stripped to its very essence, which infuses Mozart’s solo piano works as well as the sister sonatas K 331, 332, 333. Both close to each other but different nevertheless, they are flooded with light, freedom, glee and nostalgia. But when Mozart bids us farewell, he says it in German “Lebewohl” which translated literally means “Live well.”

To echoe Beethoven's own words: "Music is the only incorporeal introduction to the world of knowledge (…) a higher revelation than all wisdom and philosophy… reaching beyond even the starry sky to the original source".

Tous ces compositeurs se sont plus ou moins bien connus les uns les autres, appréciés réciproquement pour la plupart (avec quelques dédains quand même, Saint-Saëns et Hahn pour Debussy, Debussy pour presque tout le monde… mais on se croisait avec civilité), et pour cet album concocté par Anne Quéffelec – avec la complicité de son fils Gaspard Dehaene dans quelques ouvrages à quatre mains –, le choix s’est arrêté sur le point commun qui relie tous ces ouvrages : la danse (et la France, hormis Mompou placé comme en exergue au début de l’album).

This is a very French-style Chopin concept album: the excellent Anne Queffélec has built a programme around the composer’s life from his childhood – represented by his very first work, a rarely-played Polonaise that he wrote when he was seven – and following him through maturity to his final Mazurka Op. 67 No. 4. There are more than a few Proustian hints: this is Chopin à la recherché du temps perdu, an exploration of a composer haunted all his life by memories of his homeland.

„Join in the dance . . . See how we dance!“ And then „Kiss whoever you like!“ Well, that remains to be seen . . .