Rameau: Suite en Mi & Suite en Ré Alexander Paley

• Jean-Philippe Rameau (1683-1764): Suite En Mi / In E:
• 1I. Allemande05:41
• 2II. Courante02:32
• 3III. Gigue en rondeau02:40
• 4IV. 2e gigue en rondeau02:38
• 5V. Le rappel des oiseaux07:24
• 6VI. 1er rigaudon00:25
• 7VII. 2e rigaudon00:31
• 8VIII. Double du 2e rigaudon00:22
• 9IX. Musette en rondeau02:14
• 10X. Tambourin01:30
• 11XI. La villageoise03:25
• 12Menuet en rondeau02:24
• Suite En Re / In D:
• 13I. Les tendres plaintes03:34
• 14II. Les niais de Sologne03:47
• 15III. 1er double02:25
• 16IV. 2e double03:08
• 17V. Les soupirs07:05
• 18VI. La joyeuse01:05
• 19VII. La follette02:00
• 20VIII. L'entretien des muses08:05
• 21IX. Les tourbillons03:21
• 22X. Les cyclopes03:44
• 23XI. Le lardon01:25
• 24XII. La boiteuse00:48
• 25La Dauphine03:28
• Total Runtime01:15:41

Info for Rameau: Suite en Mi & Suite en Ré

My first encounter with Rameau came when I was seven years old. The piano was predominant in musical life in the Soviet Union at the time but Johann Sebastian Bach was the only composer to represent the baroque era. Ever-present in concert halls, his compositions were also the daily bread of young pianists in music school. My first teacher had been born in Paris and had a deep knowledge and strong sense of French culture, especially French literature. Thanks to him, I in turn fell in love with France in general and Rameau in particular, and Rameau has stayed with me ever since. I have always kept him in a corner of my mind without ever being able to play his music in public, because unfortunately concert organisers, including in France, then as now prefer composers better known to the general public.

The harpsichord was a rarity, to say the least, in the Russia of my childhood. It had been introduced by Wanda Landowska, who played for Leon Tolstoy at his house in Yasnaya Polyana in 1907 and 1909, but nothing ever really came of her visit. Landowska’s instrument was very different from those in use nowadays, of course, but ultimately that has no real significance. A harpsichordist is not a pianist; two different skill sets are involved. Although I could play a harpsichord – it is a keyboard instrument after all – I could not claim to really understand the instrument. So I approach Rameau’s music unequivocally as a pianist. I am not the first, far from it in fact, to argue that the sound qualities of Rameau’s music lend themselves entirely to performance on the piano.

There is no question here of merely imitating the harpsichord. It seems a great shame not to make full use of the possibilities our modern piano has to offer, as Glenn Gould – a musician I admire unreservedly – did with Bach. In particular, I use the pedal not to achieve greater legato but to add a wider range of colours to my interpretation, always provided of course that those colours are compatible with Rameau. And colour has always been crucially important in French music. I have also been particularly attentive to tempo. Rameau himself said that the tempo should never be too fast, and in fact his markings are very precise. Pushkin wrote that “serving the lyre rules out vanity”. Tempo must not be a matter of vanity; it must be the speed of execution which allows the performer to articulate everything contained in the music. When Rameau writes “fast”, “very fast” or even “faster”, he means that each ornament must still be clearly articulated, and his ornaments are very difficult to execute.

On the question of ornaments, for which the composer left a very full table, I concur with the great Wanda Landowska when she said that during the baroque era, any musician incapable of ornamenting or improvising was considered illiterate. A repeat, for example, needed ornamentation; it was like another aspect of the same piece. As I see it, ornamentation is like a vast field into which the performer can introduce the material that existed around Rameau in his own day. In La Vénitienne (First Book, 1706), for example, after playing exactly what Rameau wrote, I have inserted quotations from Domenico Scarlatti and Padre Martini (his famous Plaisir d’amour). That is also why I have introduced the Dies iræ into the variations of the famous Gavotte. I am profoundly convinced that I am entitled to do so. I have tried to play each phrase, each note penned by Rameau because the text remains the bible and must be scrupulously respected. But Debussy said that music happened between the notes and it is up the performer to discover what exists in the realm beyond paper and ink. What I play has nothing whatsoever to do with transcription as practised so superbly by Godowski. Nor is it an attempt to transform the music into something a hypothetical contemporary audience can listen to. I simply try to share the immense beauty that comes into being as I sit and play and the listener sits and listens.

Alexander Paley, piano

Alexander Paley
is widely acclaimed for his dazzling technical prowess, his exceptionally broad and extensive repertoire of concerti and solo piano works, and the depth of his unique and personal interpretations.

The Washington Post called Paley's 1991 debut with the National Symphony a "flawless performance," and since then, he has earned similar accolades for performances with the Los Angeles Philharmonic, Boston Pops, Aspen Festival Orchestra, Minnesota Orchestra, and the St. Louis, San Diego, Utah, Colorado, Milwaukee, Seattle, and Syracuse Symphony Orchestras. He made his Carnegie Hall debut with the American Composers Orchestra in the 1996-7 season with the world premier of a new concerto by Sheila Silver, at which time The New York Times wrote: "The pianist … played like a man possessed"

Recital appearances throughout the United States have taken Mr. Paley to San Francisco, Los Angeles, Richmond, Atlanta, the Kennedy Center in Washington DC, Chicago's Allied Arts Series, and the Seattle International Festival. A favorite with audiences in Washington, DC, Mr. Paley gave the first of his now annual recitals in the 1999-2000 season, playing the dedicatory recital for the German embassy's new Bluthner piano and also playing at the Dumbarton Concert Series with a program featuring J.S. Bach's Goldberg Variations and French Suite No.5. The Washington Post review of this recital began: "Once in a while, never often enough, a recital is so exhilarating that it reaches far into the intermission, which becomes a delicious interlude between the lingering vapors of superlative artistry already experienced and the enormous pleasure of knowing there is still more to come". Since that first recital, his annual return to DC has included the complete Mozart Solo Sonatas in 2004 and an "all Liszt concert" that was recorded and heard on WET's "Front Row Washington" in 2011.

Born in Kishiniev, Moldova, Mr.Paley began his piano study at age 6. He gave his first recital at age 13 and at 16, he won the National Music Competition of Moldova. Subsequently, he studied at the Moscow Conservatory with Bella Davidovich and Vera Gornostayeva, completing his graduate work in 1981. He went on to win major awards, including First Prize at the Leipzig International Bach Competition in 1884, the Bosendorfer Prize in 1986, the Grand Prix at the first International Pancho Vladigerov Competition (Bulgaria) in 1986, the Grand Prix Young Artist Debut (New York) in 1988, Prize at Aiex de Vries (Belgium) in 1990, and Les Victoires de la Musique Classique (France) in 2006.

Prior to his defection to the United States in 1988, Mr. Paley performed frequently as a recitalist and soloist throughout the former Soviet Union and Eastern Europe and was a featured soloist during numerous tours with the Moscow Virtuosi under Vladimir Spivakov. Mr. Paley now continues to perform extensively throughout Europe, China and South America, including concerti performances with orchestras including the Orchestre National de France, the MDR Orchestra, Orchestre Philharmonique de Radio France, Orchestre Philharmonique Monte Carlo, Lithuanian State Symphony Orchestra, Latvian National Symphony Orchestra, Ensemble Orchestre de Paris, and Montreal Symphony. Conductors he has played with include Myung-Whun Chung, Ivan Fisher, Marin Alsop, Zdenek Macal, Lawrence Foster, Peter Ruzicka, and Jean-Claude Casadesus, among others.

His recital appearances include Radio France, Theatre des Champs-Elysees, Salle Pleyel, Salle Gaveau (Paris), the Grands Interprètes series (Lyon), Lille Piano Festival, Opera Theatre of Besançon, and in other cities including Montpellier, Nancy, Metz, Bourges, Amiens (France), Leipzig Gewandhaus, Concertgebouw (Amsterdam), Laeiszhalle (Hamburg), The Forbidden City Concert Hall (Beijing, China), Linz and Vienna (Austria), and many locations in Germany.

Mr. Paley has partnered eminent artists such as Bella Davidovich, Mstislav Rostropovich, and Vladimir Spivakov, and has performed chamber music with important ensembles, including the Vermeer, Ysaye, and the Fine Arts string quartets, as well as with principal players from major orchestras, including the MDR Leipzig Orchestra, the New York Philharmonic, and the Montpellier Philharmonic.

The year 2011 marked the 20th anniversary of Mr. Paley's festival at the Moulin d'Ande in Normandy, France. This festival, a week-long series of recitals, lieder, and chamber music concerts, has become a highlight of the season for many French music lovers. It has been the subject of an hour-long documentary by Russian television, which has been broadcast thoughout Eastern Europe, as well as Israel. As part of the festival, in 1997, Mr. Paley made his conducting debut with performances of Pergolesi's La Serva Padrone and Telemann's Pimpinone at the Theatre of Evreux Scene National in France. Since then, he has conducted and played the compelete J.S. Bach Concerti for solo pianos, two, three, and four pianos; the complete Mozart Concerti for solo piano, two, and three pianos; the complete Beethoven piano concerti; Mendelssohn Concerti for piano solo with the Ensemble Orchestre de Paris; and conducted Verdi's La Traviata at the National Opera of Moldova. In addition, Mr. Paley has a yearly festival in Richmond,Virginia (USA), which has drawn both popular and critical acclaim for its bold programming and brilliant performances since its creation in 1998.

Mr. Paley has made numerous recordings of a wide range of works, including the complete solo piano works of Balakirev (E.S.S.A.Y), works by Scriabin and Weber (Naxos), cello and piano sonatas by Chopin and Rachmaninoff (with cellist Alexandre Dmitriev) (Accord), the Liszt transcription of Beethoven's Septour (Musidisc), the world premier recording of Giovanni Sgambati's piano concerto with the Orchestre Philharmonique Montpellier (Actes Sud Musicales), a 1994 recording of Anton Rubinstein's Piano Concerti No.2 and No.4 with the Russian State Orchestra, a 2003 recording of the Sheila Silver piano concerto with the Lithuanian State Symphony Orchestra conducted by G. Rinkevičius (Naxos), a recording of works by Jean-Louis Agobet with the Pro Philharmonique Orchestre of Strasbourg (Timpani). Mr. Paley has recorded a series of CDs on the Bluthner label, including 10 pieces of Romeo and Juliet and Two Suites from Cinderella by Prokofiev, Mozart, Beethoven, Brahms und Bartel, Chopin, Bach: Goldberg Variations, Bach: the Well-Tempered Clavier as well as a DVD titled "Bluthner soiree with Alexander Paley", featuring Schubert/Liszt Song Tanscriptions (live performance) from Leipzig. His last releases include both Enesco cello sonatas with cellist Alexandre Dmitriev and the complete violin sonatas of Enesco with violinist Amiram Ganz (Label Saphir), and Tchaikowsky's Grand Sonata in G major and complete Seasons (Label Aparté).

Booklet for Rameau: Suite en Mi & Suite en Ré