MOZART
"Vous n'aimez pas Mozart ?
Quoi de plus normal lorsque l'on ne cesse de nous rebattre les oreilles à l'aide d'une mitraillette pianistique généralement trop bien réglée. Osez franchir le pas et venez essayer un Mozart chanté, théatral, enrobé dans un son de piano vibrant mais moelleux. "
EXPLORATIONS
" Voici donc la réédition de mon premier disque…
Y est jeté un pont entre deux cultures au travers du répertoire français et brésilien...
Je suis enchantée que ces oeuvres soient enfin disponibles au grand public, car même si j'ai passé une bonne partie de ma carrière à défendre le répertoire français aux Etats Unis (Ravel, Debussy et Messiaen tout spécialement), peu de personnes en Europe ont connaissance de cette facette de mon pianisme.
Ce disque contient également ma version préférée du Rudepoeme, qui n'est rien d'autre que le "Petrouchka" ou le "Gaspard de la nuit"... Brésilien!
Que toutes ces couleurs ravissent vos oreilles! ""
AEQUILIBRIUM, Romances sans Paroles de F.B. Mendelssohn
"Je crois que je peux affirmer sans me tromper que Mendelssohn est peut-être pour les pianistes un des compositeurs les moins bien compris. Que de fois n’ai-je entendu son expression, sa virtuosité – certes mesurée par une justesse dans le contrepoint et l’élégance naturelle de ses phrases - et ses drames romantiques réduits à une suite de notes qui ne sont que trop bien ciselées. Tout en respectant sa pudeur, j’ai essayé de lui restituer sa grandeur et ses éclats, ainsi que la profondeur de son expression."
Almeida Prado, Concertos
"Honouring composers, and rendering the music with all is vigour, this is the mission I give myself, especially when it comes to a composer I have been so close to: his friendship has always lit up my hours, even the darkest. I am particularly pleased to have been able to record these three concertos, in the company of the excellent conductor Fabio Mechetti and his orchestra (OFMG); together, the telluric power (like a Prokofiev concerto) and the iridescent nuances of José Antonio's creations by Almeida Prado could finally be expressed.''
Domenico Scarlatti, Sonatas
"One winter night, when I had just finished recording Rudepoema (from Villa-Lobos), in the cold and fatigue, the idea of recording some Scarlatti came naturally to me. I have always had the greatest admiration for his music, full of vitality, and for this baroque composer who represents for me invention and creativity despite exile.
Perhaps it was this connection with my personal uprooting that caused the desire to continue recording this composer, and two weeks later I found myself with a complete Scarlatti CD.
Some may see it as a first step towards #MagnaSequentia, my Bach project. As far as I am concerned, I have always balanced my work: where there is complexity, it is important for me to bring back clarity, light.
Somehow, isn't that our wish to all, in these troublesome times?"
J.S Bach, Magna Sequentia I
"Bach: these few letters sometimes symbolise for pianists, if not fear, at most the systematic impossibility of finding one's freedom.
The love that bound me to his music was finally stronger than the rest, and I then resumed a journey on the path of the apprentice of Nicolau de Figueiredo, himself a pupil of Scott Ross. This record is the living sound trace of a return to dance and an insolent ‘joie de vivre’ that I now share with the late Nicolau."
J.S Bach, Magna Sequentia II
"For a pianist, to be with a problem worthy of a Hollywood franchise is quite amusing: how can I continue to be inventive by reusing a concept that inspired me so much? It was in the company of another harpsichordist, Edmundo Hora, that I resolved this paradox in a more serene, calm and gentle trajectory. Here, an even more subtle balance developed, as an ode to the tolerance of several versions of ourselves."
Itiberês, a family of musicians
" "Vladimir Horowitz said that it took "at least one Rachmaninov to make a third-rank piece (like Beethoven's Turkish March) a work of art."
"Without discrediting these composers in any way, this quotation applies fully: giving nobility to music that is not meant to be serious, this is… a serious job!
It is sometimes enticing to exercise the opposite of our rigor of work. Therefore, I would love your ears to delight and revel in all that this music can offer you, including evocations of my native country."
Villa-Lobos, The First
"There are tasks that are titanic... What Renaissance painter has not sighed before yet another representation of a biblical scene, risking with every step the instant transformation into a vulgar and worn out ‘lieu commun’?
The young pianist that I was, of Brazilian nationality, with all that it represented in the American collective imagination that surrounded me, probably let go more than a sigh... However, with more hindsight, I do not regret having offered this repertoire the seriousness, dedication and spirit of my younger years.
This disc does begin the painting of the pianistic fresco of the most prolific composer of Brazil. "
Villa-Lobos, Second Volume
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"I have never experienced such a correspondence between a mentality and a number. Indeed, I recorded this record in a ‘second state’: unfortunately, few people understand what a young artist has to go through: loneliness, grudging journeys, small and multiple tasks multiplying in order to be able to win a few hours with this gentle time-consuming giant that is the piano.
On top of this, there is what probably characterises the essence of Russian and Brazilian music: the overwhelming ‘spleen’ of exile, of daily reality crushing you and leaving only an infinite melancholy, which you transform, when you are a musician, into a Waltz of Pain."
Villa-Lobos, Third Volume
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"Our society knows and recognizes the writer's blank page, the great defeats of the sportsman... but, our society also fantasises about the dreamy musician, eyes in the air, waiting for the famous inspiration... While we need the resourcefulness of the first and the discipline of the second to overcome great challenges, this record has three (the Three Cycles, ed.).
I also felt a heavy burden on my shoulders, that of recording the most well-known pieces of Villa-Lobos (Ciclo Brasileiro).
If the image evoked of the musician above is false, the desire to amaze the listener never left me. And sometimes, the conditions, our will as an artist and the desires of the composer come together, to create this almost childlike magic that brings us together: a real moment of music."
Villa-Lobos, Fourth Volume
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"The last American album of this Villa-Lobos’ Saga: a painful nostalgia is present, hardly masked by episodes of sparkling virtuosity. Perhaps my polyphonic questions about Bach began at this time, Villa-Lobos himself was so imbued with it! (Editor's note: cf the Bachianas Brasileiras, bearing the name of the famous Kantor!)"
Villa-Lobos, Fifth Volume
"If the albums preceding this one bore a trace of Bach, some will find in this one some Schumannian traces in its harmony. For my part, I find an approach that the great composers of the twentieth century all have in common: Like Prokofiev, Kodaly, Bartok, Rachmaninov and so many others, Villa-Lobos seizes the folklore of his native country to transcribe it, on the European instrument, king of so-called scholarly music: The piano."
Villa-Lobos, Sixth Volume
"At this point in time I spent with Villa-Lobos’ pieces, I was struck by the gigantism and diversity of his work, probably symbolised by the Rudepoêma, which was the object of my thesis at The Juilliard School. If this monstrous piece was dedicated to Arthur Rubinstein, I must confess I was inspired by the tutelary figure of Vladimir Horowitz to achieve a perfectionism of color and thus, give a colossal dimension to these Brazilian themes."
Villa-Lobos, Seventh Volume
"Here is yet another proof of the genius of Villa-Lobos: Unlike Stravinsky's Petrouchka, Amazonas is a masterpiece for the piano (which was brilliantly transcribed for orchestra) where modernity and colour mix. It was very pleasant to record this work surrounded by shorter pieces, sometimes still freely inspired by the Leipzig master. (cf. Preludes) "
Villa-Lobos, The last one
"It is always difficult for an artist to say goodbye to his projects. Especially when it's such a long, rewarding job. I think I can easily say that my life seemed pretty empty for a while after the end of all this... But this record is by no means empty, quite the contrary, the piano resonates like never before with the Art of Villa Lobos!"
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