COMPOSERS: Debussy
LABELS: Berlin Classics
WORKS: Pour le piano; Poissons d’or; Les collines d’Anacapri; Feux d’artifice; L’isle joyeuse
PERFORMER: Cécile Ousset (piano)
CATALOGUE NO: BC 2171-2 ADD (1970)
Cécile Ousset is a pianist with terrific technical flair and power, though her Debussy interpretations have less successful moments as well as more successful. She is at her best in ‘Poissons d’Or’, an extract from the second book of Images, where the flickering gold of leaping fish comes across very well – however, the wateriness of Jardins sous la pluie is oddly absent. The programme itself seems a little odd – snippets of this and that, Pour le piano being the only substantial set of pieces represented in its entirety. However, don’t be put off by the sleeve’s exceptionally misguided English translation of L’isle joyeuse as ‘The Cheerful Island’. Jessica Duchen
Debussy: Pour le piano; Poissons d'or; Les collines d'Anacapri; Feux d'artifice; L'isle joyeuse
Cécile Ousset is a pianist with terrific technical flair and power, though her Debussy interpretations have less successful moments as well as more successful. She is at her best in ‘Poissons d’Or’, an extract from the second book of Images, where the flickering gold of leaping fish comes across very well – however, the wateriness of Jardins sous la pluie is oddly absent. The programme itself seems a little odd – snippets of this and that, Pour le piano being the only substantial set of pieces represented in its entirety.
Our rating
4
Published: January 20, 2012 at 3:15 pm