Leon McCawley: Leon McCawley: Piano Recital - COMPACT DISCS

Leon McCawley: Leon McCawley: Piano Recital - COMPACT DISCS

Leon McCawley
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Title:

Leon McCawley: Piano Recital

Artist:

Leon McCawley

Label:

Somm Recordings

Product Type:

COMPACT DISCS

UPC:

748871071728

Genre:

Classical Artists

Release Date:

2026-05-15

Number of Discs:

1

SOMM Recordings continues it's long collaboration with pianist Leon McCawley, named one of today's most impeccably musical pianists by International Piano. His past recordings for SOMM include much-admired releases of piano music by Chopin; Barber (Critics' Choice in Gramophone); Brahms (Classic FM CD of the Week); Schumann; Rachmaninoff Complete Preludes; Haydn Sonatas and Variations (awarded a Diapason d'Or); Schubert; three further volumes of Haydn Sonatas; and the 2024 release Natural Connection, about which Gramophone wrote: This scintillatingly varied recital combines sensuous virtuosity, compelling charm and musical probity. Highly recommended.In this recital McCawley presents some of his old favourites by composer-pianists Liszt, Beethoven, Chopin, and Franck. While the recital focuses on 19th century composers, the programme begins and ends with a nod to J.S. Bach. Among Bach's works that Franz Liszt revered were his six organ preludes and fugues. In transcribing them for piano, Liszt became a major influence on later arrangers. Heard here is the first in the set, Prelude and Fugue in A minor.The Piano Sonata in C major, Op. 53, The Waldstein, by Beethoven-dedicated to his friend and patron, Count Ferdinand von Waldstein-comes from his aptly named Heroic period. It was written in 1804, two years after the watershed moment of his Heiligenstadt Testament, when he had contemplated suicide because of his encroaching deafness, but instead made the profound choice to channel his despair into a bold new musical style. The Waldstein Sonata is a vivid expression of this newfound path and of Beethoven's ability to transcend personal adversity to create ground-breaking works of deep complexity.One of the renowned out-takes of musical history is Beethoven's Andante favori. He originally intended it as the slow movement of his Waldstein Sonata, but he substituted it with a shorter adagio labelled Introduzione. He had formed an attachment to the piece, though, and he published it as a stand-alone work, including it frequently in subsequent recitals. In an engaging piece of programming, Leon McCawley pairs it here with the Waldstein Sonata.Two introspective works by Chopin follow. The Berceuse is a series of continuous contemplations on a simple, nocturne-like theme. In the Barcarolle, Chopin's affinity to the bel canto operatic style is strongly apparent, especially in the beautiful, florid figurations in the right hand.Leon McCawley closes his beautifully curated recital with the Prélude, Choral et Fugue for solo piano by César Franck. Franck was trained as a pianist, but he served as an organist at Paris's Sainte-Clotilde Church from 1858 until his death in 1890. Inspired by the rich, orchestral sound of the Cavaillé-Coll organ there, he developed a grandiose, improvisatory style of keyboard writing that was harmonically influenced by Bach but thoroughly romantic in expression.

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