Helene Grimaud

Helene Grimaud – Resonances (2010)
FLAC (tracks) 24-bit/96 kHz | Time – 01:08:35 minutes | 1,03 GB | Genre: Classical
Studio Master, Official Digital Download – Source: HDTracks | Front Cover | © Deutsche Grammophon
Recorded: Berlin, Rundfunk-Zentrum, 9/2010; Recorded, edited and mastered by Emil Berliner Studios

Hélène Grimaud’s 2010 album Resonances has a program with a unifying theme, though some explaining is needed to tease it out of the music. All of the works presented on this CD are notable products of the musical heritage of the Austro-Hungarian empire, and the connections Grimaud makes go backward in time to Wolfgang Amadeus Mozart, then pass through Franz Liszt to Alban Berg and Béla Bartók. While the Classical, Romantic, and modernist styles exhibited here are strikingly different from each other — and the average listener shouldn’t be expected to find much in common with Mozart’s Sonata in A minor; Berg’s Sonata, Op. 1; Liszt’s Sonata in B minor; and Bartók’s Romanian Folk Dances — Grimaud nonetheless contends that lines can be drawn through the cultures, languages, and musical expressions of eastern Europe that influenced all these composers. Beyond this broad theme, the playing is characteristic of Grimaud — impetuous, brooding, and vigorous, but above all passionate and showy — so the listener may care less about the ideas justifying her selections when actually hearing her volatile performances. Grimaud is at her best in the Berg and Liszt sonatas, and her elastic rubato is quite effective in these moody works. Her manner of delivery is less attuned to Mozart’s precise music, which needs tighter control and less rushing, or to Bartók’s charming vignettes, which seem almost tossed off here. While some mental leaps are required to follow the album’s thesis, expressed in liner notes adapted from an interview, fans of this virtuoso pianist will draw the direct conclusion that the music is all that matters, and give Grimaud their undivided attention. Others, however, may find the album a mixed lot. ~~ AllMusic Review by Blair Sanderson

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Hélène Grimaud – Water (2016)
FLAC (tracks) 24-bit/44,1 kHz | Time – 57:23 minutes | 455 MB | Genre: Classical
Studio Master, Official Digital Download – Source: Q0buz | Artwork: Digital booklet | @ Deutsche Grammophon

With the aptly-named Water, Hélène Grimaud probes the strength and beauty of H20, the most precious gift of nature, and a source of fascination for the pianist. Produced by Nitin Sawhney, who appears more regularly on the electro scene, here he has especially emphasized the fascination that water has inspired in many composers of the nineteenth and twentieth centuries. This idea not only led to this record, it also resulted in a project of the Grimaud with Scottish artist Douglas Gordon, previous winner of the Turner Prize: a concert-installation entitled Tears Become … designed specifically for the exercise room of a former military building in New York’s Park Avenue Armory. Performed in December 2014, this show mixes visual art, music and architecture, and has at its center the “Water” programme of Hélène Grimaud. Before she starts playing, the gigantic hall was gradually flooded to give the impression of a huge “water field” (in the words of Gordon), which eventually encircled the piano concert. Nine composers are represented on the album which opens with Berio’s Wasserklavier (“aquatic Piano”). Rain Tree Sketch II by Takemitsu, the Fifth Barcarolle by Fauré, Ravel’s Jeux d’eau, Almería Iberia by Albéniz, the Liszt’s Jeux d’eau à la Villa d’Este, the Andante Dans les brumes of Janáček and Debussy’s La Cathédrale engloutie. These pages were recorded live during the New York concert-installation and then linked together by seven Transitions written and recorded by Nitin Sawhney. Finally, with Water, Hélène Grimaud brought together in a unique way her twin passions for music and the environment… (more…)