Les Siècles breathe fresh life into Ravel’s piano concertos

No composer was more precise in the composition of his music than Ravel. Every sound, every specific combination of instruments was imagined in his ear and notated with exactness, and he expected the same of his performers when they brought that music to life.

This new recording of his two piano concertos, both from the 1930s, takes precision in performance one step further. All the musicians involved, including soloist Cédric Tiberghien, are playing period instruments that might have been used at the premieres.

Tiberghien plays a Pleyel “Grand Patron” piano of 1892, less brilliant than a modern grand but benefiting from the delicacy of its more matt colours and softer attack. The slow movement of the Piano Concerto in G Major, one of Ravel’s most magical inventions, would cast a hush over any concert hall.

The instruments of Les Siècles, conducted by its founder François-Xavier Roth, include many turn-of-the-century wind and brass, lighter than today’s counterparts. The finale of the G Major Concerto has a playful wit, with no hint of vulgarity, and the jazz-inflected Concerto for the Left Hand offers keenly sifted sounds throughout. The delight of these performances is hearing so much that is fresh and new, the timbres closer than usual to what Ravel would have expected.

In between come a selection of Ravel’s songs, including “Don Quichotte à Dulcinée” and the “Trois Poèmes de Stephane Mallarmé”, sung by Stéphane Degout, always an exemplary French baritone in mélodies — an unusual but welcome bonus.

★★★★★

‘Ravel: Concertos For Piano’ is released by Harmonia Mundi