Here's a lovely bit of pianistic enchantment from Arturo Benedetto Michelangeli, playing one of the Canciones y Danzas of Federico Mompou, a Catalan composer I only recently became aware of. This piece is so simple, so delicate, but so rich in beauty...
Thanks, Nige! You've reminded me to dig out my CD of Stephen Hough playing Mompou. During the late 1990's, I spent a lot of time traveling by train between Paris, London, Cambridge and Norwich, and that CD was in constant rotation on my good old Sony Discman.
The key to the apparent simplicity in Mompou's music is a complete absence of what they call here in Spain 'el amor propio - if you like, 'self-regard'. And Hough is surely Waldonymous, the natural successor of Michelangeli in his ability to express this vapourous music?
Yes - partly because of that absence, he seems the least Spanish of Spaniards (OK, Catalans) - much more in the French line - Debussy, Satie, Ravel... I must see if I can get that CD.
Nige, who, like Mr Kenneth Horne, prefers to remain anonymous, was also a founder blogger of The Dabbler and a co-blogger on the Bryan Appleyard Thought Experiments blog. He is the sole blogger on this one, and his principal aim is to share various of life's pleasures. These tend to relate to books, art, poems, butterflies, birds, churches, music, walking, weather, drink, etc, with occasional references to the passing scene. His book, The Mother of Beauty: On the Golden Age of English Church Monuments, and Other Matters of Life and Death, is available on Amazon or direct from the author.
Thanks, Nige! You've reminded me to dig out my CD of Stephen Hough playing Mompou. During the late 1990's, I spent a lot of time traveling by train between Paris, London, Cambridge and Norwich, and that CD was in constant rotation on my good old Sony Discman.
ReplyDeleteThe key to the apparent simplicity in Mompou's music is a complete absence of what they call here in Spain 'el amor propio - if you like, 'self-regard'. And Hough is surely Waldonymous, the natural successor of Michelangeli in his ability to express this vapourous music?
ReplyDeleteYes - partly because of that absence, he seems the least Spanish of Spaniards (OK, Catalans) - much more in the French line - Debussy, Satie, Ravel... I must see if I can get that CD.
ReplyDeleteNige....Presto Classical...Arturo Benedetti Michelangeli: The Master Pianist
DeleteThanks Malty - I can't find a CD of that title exactly...? Have just got the Stephen Hough Mompou CD though - looking forward to that...
ReplyDelete