Oeuvres pour la main gauche /vol.3

Description

This anthology of works for the left hand - the first ever created - presents major pieces from the repertoire, including the famous Concerto for the Left Hand by Maurice Ravel, composed for Paul Wittgenstein, an Austrian pianist who lost his right arm during World War I. It allows for the discovery or rediscovery of entire sections of our pianistic literature, the extent and richness of which remain little known. The names of the greatest composers are indeed associated with it. "The idea of exploring this repertoire came to me a few years ago while studying for the first time the famous Concerto for the Left Hand by Maurice Ravel. The wonder of feeling as if I were hearing two hands while only five fingers were playing fascinated me. Some composers have risen to this challenge with exceptional talent. After a first disc volume dedicated to Ravel, Scriabin, Chopin, Saint-Saëns, and Bach, followed by a second featuring, among others, works by Blumenfeld, Bartók, Alkan, Schulhoff, and Reger, I wanted to continue exploring this repertoire by bringing together in this third opus equally essential works, this time highlighting transcriptions. With the Cape Philharmonic Orchestra, I will dedicate a fourth volume to three concertos composed by Ravel, Prokofiev, and Britten, whose dedicatee is none other than Paul Wittgenstein, the Austrian pianist who lost his right arm during World War I. These pieces demonstrate the immense possibilities of the left hand, which, thanks to the arrangement of its fingers, its natural flexibility, and its powerful range in the lower register of the keyboard, can make the piano sound like an orchestra on its own! I am very happy to be able to showcase the undeniable poetic richness of this original, virtuosic, and spectacular repertoire, which is too underrepresented in the musical landscape. I hope that this anthology, the first ever created, will help discover or rediscover these masterpieces." Maxime Zecchini