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There is no doubt that the piano was George Gershwin’s favourite instrument. It is also the means by which German pianist Corinna Simon expresses her musical ideas, the vehicle she uses to interpret her versions and to give us an insight into her musical psyche.
Her admiration for the American composer and his music is manifest in her new CD recording, which features some of his works, played on the historical Steinway Concert Grand Piano D, 1901, known as the Manfred Burki.
Burki was a renowned Steinway specialist, and it was he who used new hammer-felts and damper heads when this instrument was being restored. This piano, renowned for its full sound, was complemented by a unique sound system recording – by Dabringhaus & Grimm – which produces works in the natural acoustics of specially chosen concert halls.
Dabringhaus & Grimm aim to give genuine reproductions with “precise depth gradation, original dynamics and natural tone colours”, thus making the recordings sound as natural, as vivid and as original as possible.
Simon agrees with this philosophy. The works that were chosen to be interpreted give the pianist the opportunity to display her classical training.
She also displays her love for Gershwin and for jazz, with works that were composed in the first part of the 20th century, when European harmony and form combined with African-American music to give birth to the genre.
I loved her emphasis on jaunty and happy tunes which have an appealing freshness about them. However, she has also brought out the beauty of more serious works, where more percussive techniques contrasted with delicate passages.
She has also brought out the beauty of more serious works, where more percussive techniques contrasted with delicate passages
The 28 tracks that make up this CD, come from Song Book; Three Preludes; An American in Paris in Miniature; Prelude; Merry Andrew; Imprompru in Two Keys; Three-Quarter Blues; Promenade; and Rhapsody in Blue, which was commissioned by Paul Whiteman.
Whiteman wanted a new work inspired by classical music and jazz for a concert he was about to hold. Gershwin only had a few weeks to compose the work, and he settled for a rhapsody style composition because it afforded him more flexibility and freedom.
His music and Simon’s interpretation of it has the feel and the rhythm of the seductive and the sensuous, but also a vividly effective display of piano pyrotechnics.