Customer Reviews

Kurtag's Ghosts

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György Kurtág is an alive and well Hungarian (Romanian) composer better known in Europe than in this country. Though his output may be rather small to date, his music is extraordinarily well constructed and rich in mood and atmosphere as he willingly shares his influences from J.S. Bach, Bartók, Berg, Beethoven, Ligeti, Messiaen, and Guillaume de Machaut. Given this rich reservoir of ideas, brilliant pianist Marino Formenti has fashioned the piano cycle 'Kurtág's Ghosts', a seamless combination of themes or phrases from other composers together with bits and pieces of Kurtág that form one of the more interesting 'experiments in music' to come along is some time.

For example, Formenti plays less than a minute of Kurtág's 'Hommage a Stockhausen' followed by less than a minute of Stockhausen's 'Klavierstuck No. 2 and a minute and a half of Messien's 'Ile de Feu 1' followed by Kurtág's '...humble regard sur Olivier Messiaen'. In all Formenti quotes from seventy short pieces in an interconnected way that is not only fascinating and illuminating but also displays Formenti's pianistic virtuosity. Intertwined with the works mentioned are moments from Haydn, Scarlatti, Schubert, Mussorgsky, Purcell, Janá'ek, and others. The question may arise as to whether this is a composition by Formenti or whether 'Kurtág's Ghosts' is meant to be a means to understanding and appreciating the works of well known composers as though associated with commentary by György Kurtág, or has Marino Formenti introduced an entirely new means of exploring the interconnectedness of the music of the ages. But listening to these two CDs creates an atmosphere unlike any other and the result is an extended period of awakening to the possibilities of just how music flows. Grady Harp, November 09

a meticulous studio recording of perhaps the single most brilliantly programmed piano recital i have ever heard, and that includes rubinstein, horowitz and serkin.

Pianist and composer/adaptor Marino Formenti contiunued the edgy plays (Jatekok) Gyorgi and Maria Kurtag performed on an earlier cd. In an exciting stream Formenti alternates ultrashort Kurtag pieces with compressed fragments of Bach, Purcell, Chopin, De Machaut, Mussorgsky, Schubert, Schumann, Boulez, Messiaen, Liszt. Janáèek, Bartok and Ligeti come closer to Kurtags own style. Obvious this rather mixed ensemble of the best piano repertoire is highly eclectic, postmodern. But how can ignore the influence of previous centuries? In the present artists are product of what predecessors allready did. Like ghosts?
Well no, I prefer to call them kindred spirits.
In an associative way - it seems - the phenomenal Formenti with pianistical genius and respect connects the quentessential fragments.
Though another genre this exciting and yet inviting approach one also finds with jazzpianogeniuses like Brad Mehldau, Michiel Braam or Chick Corea who quote from their colleagues like Tristano, Evans, Monk.
Like them Formrnti surprises the listener again and again. The intimate atmosphere, balancing between piannissimo and fortissimo still makes this music suitable to be listened to by one person or before a concentrated audience.