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With his carefully crafted concept album entitled "Vox Humana" cellist Isang Enders presents a study in sound and the portrayal of a musical network of contacts. For his third release on the Berlin Classics label he has painstakingly chosen French works from four centuries and approached each of them in a very individual manner, setting himself and his audience the challenge of not simply listening, but of perceiving. Isang Enders sees Claude Debussy as the starting point for his approach. "The first time I played Debussy, my teacher at the time told me: 'use a lot of bow, minimum pressure, lots of air'. Yet Debussy gives precise instructions above each note as to how to play it. Creating one's own individual interpretation within such strict lines has to be based on timing and nuance. You have to open up your wardrobe, so to speak, seek out every colour and structure available. It's a laborious process". From Debussy and his nuances, Isang Enders then casts his gaze into the past and into the future. He views Marin Marais as a musical forefather of Debussy, whose music is "unbelievably vocal, much more so than one might think". After the Baroque pioneer Enders turns his sights deep into the 20th century – via Stravinsky, the Boulanger sisters Lili and Nadia to Messiaen, "the logical successor to Debussy". The heart of the matter for Enders is always the question: How do the individual composers' sound concepts differ and how do they transpose them to the cello with its tone that is close to the human voice? Most of the works on the "Vox Humana" album were not originally written for cello; Enders had to arrange them, which allowed him to concentrate more closely on each work. He arranged Debussy for example for cello and guitar; he plays the Marais with two cellos and Messiaen with the harmonium, organ and the rare theremin, "in essence an electric "vox humana". I follow the spirit that emanates from the work in question: the sacred, choral tonal language of Clair de lune, the pert last movement by Nadia Boulanger, the fire and imagination to be found in the Intermezzo and the Pantomime. And then back to Marais with Les Voix humaines, where one really has the impression of hearing a person singing". Isang Enders speaks of Baroque and Impressionist legato slurs, of the aesthetics of precision, of nuance and contrasting structures, thereby creating a huge arc between various eras and gathering all of the works closer together, while allowing them each individually to expand their richness of detail. His musical partners on "Vox Humana" are also his personal companions: he knows pianist Sunwook Kim, Scottish guitarist Sean Shibe and his cello colleague Mischa Meyer through his active concert schedule in all parts of the world, from his student days or in his position as leader of the cello section with the Saxon Staatskapelle of Dresden, which he achieved at the age of 20. He first met the famous theremin player Carolina Eyck, who tours the world with her special instrument, in a youth orchestra and last but not least, his father is featured on the album too, playing harmonium and organ. © Berlin Classics

In the middle of the 16th century, the Geneva Psalter infected the whole of Reformed Europe – Switzerland included – with a true psalm fever. The first complete collection of all 150 psalms, promoted by the Genevan reformer Jean Calvin, was published in 1562. The psalm verses were translated into French and provided with melodies by various Genevan cantors. Thanks to the collection’s immense importance for the Reformation and its unique artistic content, these psalms inspired like none before the most influential composer of the time to write a large number of polyphonic psalm settings. The four-part psalms composed by Claude Goudimel (ca. 1514-1572) were published in 1564, just two years after their initial release. Set in a simple note-against-note setting with the well-known Genevan melodies in the tenor part, these psalms quickly gained incredible popularity. © Claves Records

Music has been described as a way of saving that which has been lost: a simple but strong idea, and one which has influenced Hélène Grimaud's artistic expression.Her new album Memory deals with music's power to bring back to life the images of the past in the present, its ability to vividly and piercingly evoke a specific time and a place. It explores the essence of memory through a series of refined miniatures for piano. The choice of repertoire covers a vast, diverse range, from the reveries of Chopin and Debussy to the timeless, folky melodies of Valentin Silvestrov.  © Universal

In a world of "singles," pursued even by classical music labels nowadays, here is a whole album that makes up a single, sublime musical utterance. Reflet is a follow-up, similarly concerned with light effects, to soprano Sandrine Piau's German-language Clair-Obscur of a few years back. The German songs might have been a bigger stretch for Piau than the French material here, but Reflet has possibly an even more sublime coherence. One feels that every note is almost foreordained as the program opens with classic orchestral songs from Berlioz, Henri Duparc, and the less common Charles Koechlin, proceeding into darker, more mysterious realms with Ravel's Trois poèmes de Stéphane Mallarmé, and ending with the youthful ebullience of Britten's Quatre chansons françaises. An illustration of how carefully calibrated everything is here comes with two Debussy pieces, Clair de lune and "Pour remercier la pluie" (from the Six Épigraphes Antiques), arranged for orchestra from other media. These serve as entr'actes between the sections of Piau's program, and they should by all rights have been annoying: aren't there enough genuine orchestral pieces that could have filled the bill? But just listen. These fit into the patterns that run through the whole album, and they make perfect sense, just like everything else. Piau's voice is delicate, soaring, and richly beautiful; one of the miracles of the current scene is its durability and versatility. Her support from conductor Jean-François Verdier, leading the Victor Hugo Orchestra, is confidently smooth, never intruding on the spell Piau weaves. A magnificent orchestral song recital that made classical best-seller lists in early 2024.© James Manheim /TiVo

Ravel's piano works include some of the most popular keyboard pieces of the 20th century, so pianist Philippe Bianconi has plenty of competition for this double-album complete cycle. Of course, one advantage of the complete set is that it can include the less common pieces like Ravel's musical impressions of Borodin and Chabrier and the Menuet en Ut dièse mineur ("Minuet in C sharp minor"). These lesser-known works, mostly miniatures, fit Bianconi's style beautifully; he is a precise, concise player who brings out Ravel's considerable rhythmic subtlety. His Ravel performances tap into a long French tradition stretching back to Robert Casadesus and his wife, Gaby, who was one of Bianconi's teachers. Imbued with the French conservatory values of clarity and restraint, Bianconi sacrifices mood for clean execution. In Le Tombeau de Couperin, he is wonderful, one of the very best available, catching the ways Ravel stretches the Baroque rhythms in a really uncanny way. Many pianists can handle the technical challenges of Gaspard de la nuit these days, but few can seem as effortless while doing so. In music that depends more on extramusical references, such as the four-hand Ma mère l'Oye (recorded with Clément Lefebvre), some listeners may want a bit more color, while others will find Bianconi's approach bracing and fresh, with an evocative Miroirs. Sample several different works. Most listeners will agree that the La Dolce Volta label's sound, from the Grande Salle at the Metz Arsenal, is ideal for the music and the music-making here. © James Manheim /TiVo

Praised for his meticulous fidelity to the composer's intentions, as well as for his rich tonal palette and the warmth of his expressions, Jean-Efflam Bavouzet has won many admirers for his five albums of the complete solo piano music of Claude Debussy. These recordings were produced by Chandos between 2007 and 2009, and they have now been gathered into a handsome box set; each disc is presented with its own cardboard sleeve and the original liner notes that accompanied each release. The roster of artists who have recorded Debussy's keyboard music is a long and distinguished one, though Bavouzet is easily ranked in the upper echelons, equal in stature among such luminaries as Jean-Yves Thibaudet, Arturo Benedetti Michelangeli, Krystian Zimerman, Maurizio Pollini, Angela Hewitt, Pierre-Laurent Aimard, and Pascal Rogé. Experienced listeners will already have favorite recordings of the Préludes, Images, Estampes, and Études, as well as the perennially popular Suite bergamasque, Children's Corner, and other picturesque pieces. However, many will be won over by the consistency of Bavouzet's playing, and newcomers will find that his disciplined yet gorgeous readings are a great way to begin appreciating these charming classics. Chandos provides excellent sound that gives the piano a clear presence yet takes nothing away from Bavouzet's atmospheric colors or the radiant acoustics. Highly recommended.© TiVo

The new delivery of the complete works for keyboard of Johann Sebastian Bach (Volume 8), brought to us by harmonia mundi, and featuring Benjamin Alard on the harpsichord, clavichord, and organ, is centred around the composer’s work while he was with his first wife, Maria Barbara. Featuring 3 CDs, or 85 tracks in this digital version, it brings together a series of compositions for educational purposes. On the one hand the Inventions and Sinfonias, on which all apprentice pianists and harpsichordists have tried their hand, and, on the other hand, the six French Suites probably composed to perfect the musical skills of their eldest son, Wilhelm Friedemann.They are “French” only in virtue of the apocryphal title which was given to them after Bach’s death. We find no trace of this mentioned on the original manuscripts. Bach's music also escapes strict classification, even if the influence of Couperin can be quite clearly perceived in this vast corpus, demonstrated by Benjamin Alard’s clever introduction of some Preludes by the French composer as an epigraph to the French Suites of Bach. Above all, these pieces are reminiscent of his own genius, with various influences intended to create a world belonging to the Cantor.Faithful to his organological research, here Benjamin Alard uses a pedal clavichord like that built by the French organ maker, Emile Jobin. The colour of this discreet instrument is simply bewitching. A sort of fruitiness is exuded, the full depth and subtlety of which can be savoured, notably in the Pedal-Exercitium, BWV 598 and in the transcription for keyboard of the famous Chaconne - Second Partita, initially composed for the violin. We also like the golden tones of the Couchet harpsichord from 1645, "restored" (modified later) by Blanchet in around 1720. We find the entirety of Benjamin Alard’s skill in this new recording; his science which illuminates complicated polyphony, his clean energy, and his curiosity for fascinating worlds of sound. © François Hudry/Qobuz

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Since the pianist's early days, the South Korean Seong-Jin Cho (1994) has professed a fondness for French music in general and Debussy in particular. At his first public performance at the age of eleven, he played Children’s Corner by Debussy. When he decided, in 2012, to pursue his musical education abroad, he chose Paris, and the Conservatoire National Supérieur, where he frequented the classes of Michel Béroff, the undisputed expert on Debussy. Cho has come back to work again with his old teacher, who became a friend, with the aim of creating his own Debussy album; the choice of works here is "restricted" to works requiring a middling level of virtuosity - mechanical exhibition isn't his thing, even though he has amply mastered his instrument - but whose poetical content allows the pianist to show off his own exquisite expertise as a musician. An homage to his own childhood, Children’s Corner, but also the two books of Images and the exquisite Suite bergamasque. Let’s not forget that Seong-Jin Cho won Warsaw's 2015 Chopin Prize, a sure-fire ticket to an international career. © SM/Qobuz

This recording is a manifesto: modernism, culture, temporality, style, improvisation are all concepts with which Joël Grare plays, like a juggler. At a time of globalisation, of standardisation of cultures, this disc lets us hear the vision of the world of one man, at one given time. The Paris-Istambul-Shanghaï Ensemble (Chinese violin, theorbo, bass and percussions) forms the musical base of this invitation to travel. The guests, such as Claire Lefilliâtre, contribute their personnality by taking up the learned or popular themes. This "group", somewhere between a chamber music ensemble and a traditional one, plays standards like Jazzmen. Their standards? Magnificent themes stemming from Spain, Turkey, China, ancient music...Analysing these melodies well beyond their borders, thoroughly enjoying them to interpret them better, improvising, composing, whether or not in the style of their country or their period, following his mood, the taste of tea, the moment; welcome to the world of Joël Grare.