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Nicolas Stavy – Haydn: The 7 Last Words of Christ, Hob.XX/1C (2019)
FLAC (tracks) 24 bit/44,1 kHz | Time – 01:02:55 minutes | 476 MB | Genre: Classical
Studio Masters, Official Digital Download | Front Cover | © BIS

The Seven Last Words of Christ refers to the seven short phrases uttered by Jesus on the cross, as gathered from the New Testament. Over the centuries the crucifixion has served as inspiration to countless composers, and settings of these utterances have become something of a subgenre, beginning in the Renaissance with early motets and continuing into our own time. By way of César Franck and Sofia Gubaidulina, composers ranging from Heinrich Schütz to Tristan Murail have contributed versions using various combinations of voice and/or instruments. The work is here heard in the version for keyboard, performed by the French pianist Nicolas Stavy. He closes the disc with another unusual work in Haydns oeuvre, the Andante con variazioni, Hob. XVII/6, which has been described as the deepest and most profound set of variations for piano composed between Bach and Beethoven.

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Nicolas Stavy – Fauré Piano Works (2019)
FLAC (tracks) 24 bit/96 kHz | Time – 59:12 minutes | 873 MB | Genre: Classical
Studio Masters, Official Digital Download | Front Cover | © BIS

This recital could almost have been entitled Around Fauré in Sixty Minutes, as the programme devised by Nicolas Stavy spans the entire career of the composer. In April 1863, when Gabriel Fauré noted down the Sonata recorded here for the first time, his 18th birthday was still a month away – the masterly Nocturne in B minor Op. 119, on the other hand, is Fauré’s final work for the piano, composed only two years before his death in 1924. Between them, and the other works included on the disc, a fascinating trajectory takes shape. In the Finale of the sonata we hear a young man enjoying himself as he experiments with a Haydnesque idiom; a few years later there are traces of Mendelssohn and Schumann in 3 Romances, and of Chopin in Mazurke – also a world première recording. Especially when it comes to the choice of genre, Chopin is still an influence during the 1870s and Nocturne No. 1 and the Ballade, but both works testify to a composer finding his own voice. Fauré went on to compose another 12 nocturnes and two of these, No. 6 in D flat major from 1894 and the aforementioned Nocturne in B minor, serve as snapshots illustrating Fauré’s later career and the composer’s path towards increasing abstraction and a style characterised by timelessness and a detachment from fashionable trends.

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