The Paths Of Silence

Description

A journey through the three major periods of Arvo Pärt, from experimentation to the tintinnabuli style, punctuated by three versions of Spiegel im Spiegel. An exceptional interpretation featuring Nicolas Chalvin, the Orchestre des Pays de Savoie, Éric Aubier, Benoit d’Hau, David Louwerse, François Daudet, Philippe Guilhon-Herbert, and the Quatuor Saxania. A luminous and deeply spiritual reading, where the rigor of the French school meets Baltic mysticism in a true listening experience. The album presents the two major musical languages of the composer, separated by "the great silence" (1968-1976). The selected pieces highlight three distinct chronological phases. The Experimental period, before 1968, that of modernism. As in Concerto Piccolo or Intervalo, he employs serialism, twelve-tone technique, and collage. It is often complex, tense, and sometimes conflicted music. The Silence period, from 1968 to 1976, during which Pärt published almost nothing. He intensely studies Gregorian chant and medieval polyphony (Machaut, Ockeghem). This is the gestation of his new identity. The Tintinnabuli period, from 1976 to the present, is the style we all know (Für Alina, Spiegel im Spiegel). The three different versions of Spiegel im Spiegel—presenting different timbres through the choice of instruments exposing the theme—are used as pivot points, structural breaths transforming this album into a form of ritual. This soothing feeling of "déjà-vu" serves as a stylistic anchor, a mirror, allowing us to measure the journey the composer has taken between the other pieces.