Poulenc – Piano Concertos; Aubade
Louis Lortie; Hélène Mercier; BBC Philharmonic; Edward Gardner
Chandos CHAN 10875
This sparkling CD includes Francis Poulenc’s works for piano and orchestra plus music for two pianists. I’ve loved Poulenc’s cheeky brews of popular and classical elements since a lighthearted teenage attempt at his Sextet for Piano and Winds, when we had a mock waiter serve drinks during my first piano solo! Compositionally, Poulenc invites us to loosen up and accept new things, but performance is not easy. In the Concerto (1949) Lortie’s ensemble with orchestra is precise without compromising rhythmic life, and he dashes off the first movement’s lounge-piano flourishes without belabouring them. Originally written for a ballet, Aubade (1929) is quintessential Poulenc. It is evocative of 1920s Paris, for piano with an orchestra stripped down to 18 instruments emphasizing winds and brass. Lortie plays the opening toccata with its challenging repeated chords immaculately, and manages the juxtaposed contrasting phrases well. The BBC Philharmonic’s winds shine in wonderfully bittersweet double-reed instrument passages and in several fine clarinet solos.
Lortie’s long-time duo-piano partner Hélène Mercier joins him in the two-piano Concerto in D Minor. They play the opening movement’s quasi-Balinese passages seamlessly. The Larghetto’s classical nostalgia and more modern sentiments come through effectively. In the dissonant final movement, double notes are crisp and chords balanced. Works for two pianists alone close the disc; in Poulenc’s four-hand Sonata and two short duo-piano pieces, Mercier and Lortie find opportunities for free dialogue and joyous music-making.
