French pianist Pierre-Laurent Aimard makes a return to North America this season, with a Toronto look at Koerner Corridor on February 28. The tour was launched partly to honour buddy and late mentor Pierre Boulez, whose a hundredth birthday falls this March.
Together with the Toronto date, he’ll carry out two recitals at New York’s Carnegie Corridor and Québec Metropolis in March.
His Toronto and New York dates emphasize the Boulez connection.
Pierre-Laurent Aimard and Pierre Boulez
Pierre-Laurent Aimard was born in Lyon, France, the place he started his music research on the Conservatoire. He’d later research privately with Yvonne Liord (second spouse of Olivier Messiaen), and Italian pianist and instructor Maria Curcio.
In 1973, on the age of 16, he gained the chamber music prize on the Paris Conservatoire — and later that yr, first prize a the Olivier Messiaen Competitors.
Aimard’s musical and private historical past with Pierre Boulez (1925–2016), an enormous of twentieth century classical music, started when Boulez invited the then 19-year-old pianist to turn into a founding member of Ensemble Intercontemporain. Boulez based EIC particularly to discover new compositional and efficiency methods, together with his personal music.
Aimard steadily collaborated with the influential composer and conductor, together with premiering his work Répons, and plenty of recordings, one in every of which snagged a Grammy nomination.
Previous to Boulez’ loss of life, Aimard talked about working with him as each composer and mentor in an interview. “Virtually each rehearsal was a music lesson, a approach to uncover a chunk, little by little. … He likes to place interpreters on the border of what’s potential and what’s not. When you like that, it’s extremely thrilling.”
Since that point, Pierre-Laurent has been a powerful advocate of Boulez’ work, and extra broadly, of twentieth century music.
The Program
Aimard will carry out three of Boulez’ main works for solo piano at his Toronto recital:
- Piano Sonata No. 1 (1946; revised 1949)
- Piano Sonata No. 2 (1948)
- 12 Notations / Douze Notations pour piano (1945)
For Toronto, he’ll add:
- Ludwig van Beethoven: 7 Bagatelles, op. 33
- Ludwig van Beethoven: 11 Bagatelles, op. 119
- Arnold Schoenberg: Six Little Piano Items, op.19
- Anton Webern: Variations for Piano, op. 27
- Claude Debussy: Études, L. 136 (3. Pour les quartes; 7. Pour les degrés chromatiques; 11. Pour les arpéges composés)
He’ll play the identical program at Membership musical de Québec (March 10). At New York’s Carnegie Corridor (March 2), he’ll add Ravel’s Gaspard de la nuit, Schoenberg’s 5 Items, and choices from Bartók’s Mikrokosmos to the Boulez works.
Aimard’s tour continues to carry out Ravel with The Philadelphia Orchestra and conductor Michael Tilson Thomas (March 7 – 9), Bartók with the Orchestre symphonique de Montréal and Tianyi Li (March 12 & 13), and Debussy with the Los Angeles Philharmonic and Esa-Pekka Salonen (Could 8, 10, & 11).
- Discover extra particulars and tickets for his February 28 Toronto recital [HERE].
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Anya Wassenberg is a Toronto Metropolis Editor at Ludwig Van. She is an skilled freelance author, blogger and writing teacher.
