Œuvres pour piano

Description

By Smetana, only a few works are known outside the Czech Republic: the first quartet, a cycle of symphonic poems, and “The Bartered Bride” essentially. Yet listening to this record, one wonders why pianists do not play the “Czech Dances” more often. The few excerpts recorded by the great Moravec deserve a place in every record collection, but the complete cycle strikes us with the variety of Smetana’s inspiration at the end of his life. The composer found in peasant melodies a way to renew his writing for the piano. The first booklet of four Polkas still evokes Schumann and Chopin. Smetana also stated his ambition to transcend the Polka, as Chopin did for the Mazurka. But the ten following pieces move away from it to adhere more closely to the turns of folk music. Certain rhythmic irregularities (in “The Bear,” for example) foreshadow the pages of Janacek or Bartok. Garrick Ohlsson knows how to vary the colors and lighting, from a virtuosic Etude (3rd Polka) to a wild dance (final Skocna), via deceptively naive popular songs. The content of the accompanying booklet will also be appreciated. (Thomas Herreng)