Chopin: Concertos for Piano & String Quintet David Lively, Quatuor Cambini-Paris & Thomas de Pierrefeu

• Frédéric Chopin (1810 - 1849): Piano Concerto No. 2 in F Minor, Op. 21:
• 1 Piano Concerto No. 2 in F Minor, Op. 21: I. Maestoso 12:14
• 2 Piano Concerto No. 2 in F Minor, Op. 21: II. Larghetto 08:33
• 3 Piano Concerto No. 2 in F Minor, Op. 21: III. Allegro vivace 08:59
• Piano Concerto No. 1 in E Minor, Op. 11:
• 4 Piano Concerto No. 1 in E Minor, Op. 11: I. Allegro Maestoso 17:49
• 5 Piano Concerto No. 1 in E Minor, Op. 11: II. Romance. Larghetto 08:29
• 6 Piano Concerto No. 1 in E Minor, Op. 11: III. Rondo. Vivace 10:24
• Total Runtime 01:06:28

Info for Chopin: Concertos for Piano & String Quintet

Chopin’s Piano Concertos are works of a twenty year old composer and ambitious soloist. Powerful and challenging, their romantic dimension also carries sensitive effusions. This duality is highlighted here by an interpretation on period instruments in a chamber version.

Choices that are as many clues to recognize the musicians from the Cambini-Paris Quartet and their accomplices: pianist David Lively and double bassist Thomas de Pierrefeu.

Direct heir to Chopin’s piano teaching legacy, David Lively chose a vintage Érard piano to record both Concertos. Accompanied by a string quintet, he revives the tradition of the genre: before being performed in big concert halls, composers and pianists like Chopin played their latest scores in music lovers’ salons. The broad ambitus covered by the strings and the richness of the sound of the pianoforte respect the symphonic dimension of those two pieces.

A musical quest for fidelity and authenticity to music and musicians and a gift for the listener.

David Lively, piano
Thomas de Pierrefeu, double bass
Quatuor Cambini-Paris

David Lively
The American-born concert pianist, David Lively, began his career at fourteen when he performed Khatchaturian's virtuoso Piano Concerto with the Saint Louis Symphony Orchestra. Lorin Maazel subsequently invited him to perform with the Cleveland Orchestra which resulted in engagements with ensembles such as the English Chamber Orchestra, Royal Philharmonic Orchestra, Vienna Symphony Orchestra, Berlin Symphony Orchestra, Budapest Philharmonic Orchestra, National Orchestra of France in collaboration with such prestigious conductors as Sir Simon Rattle, Sir Colin Davis, Erich Leinsdorf, Lovro von Matacic, Kurt Sanderling, Sergiu Comissiona, Ferdinand Leitner, Walter Weller, Leonard Slatkin, Jesus Lopez-Cobos, Michael Tilson Thomas, etc. A gifted artist at home in a breadth of styles, David Lively has a repertoire of over sixty works, more than ten of which he has recorded on CD.

Particularly interested in the American 20th century musical heritage, David Lively focused on the masterpieces of Elliott Carter and Aaron Copland, with whom he both studied and recorded their works. His enthusiasm for such neglected masterpieces as Busoni's and Furtwängler's monumental Piano Concertos led to recordings of both works, the CD of Furtwängler's being the first of the unabridged and definitive version. He also devotes his attention to performing contemporary works, giving the European premiere of "Riverrun" by Takemitsu with conductor Kent Nagano, the French premiere of "90+" for piano solo by Elliott Carter as well as "Cendres" by Kaija Saariaho. Most recently, he gave the world premiere of the chamber concerto "Cris" by William Blank, a work written specially for him and the Orchestre de la Suisse Romande, and Michael Travlos' Double Concerto with the Moscow Radio Orchestra conducted by Vladimir Fedosseyev.

The Saint Lizier Festival in the French Pyrenees, which David Lively directs every summer, reveals his devotion to the organisation and performance of numerous chamber music concerts together with artists such as the Melos and Borodine Quartets, violinists Gil Shaham, Myriam Fried, Augustin Dumay and pianists Martha Argerich, Eugene Istomin, among many others.

David Lively studied in the United States and in France at the Ecole Normale de Musique de Paris where he now resides, in addition acquiring French citizenship. Prize-winner in numerous international competitions, including the Marguerite Long-Jacques Thibaud where he met Claudio Arrau, to become one of his rare pupils, the Queen Elisabeth and the Tchaikowsky where he won the special prize for contemporary music, David Lively has also been awarded the Dino Ciani Prize of the Scala of Milan in 1977.

Having taught at the National Superior Music Conservatoire of Paris, David Lively has also given master classes at the Hochschule in Vienna, the Royal Scottish Academy of Glasgow and the Chapelle Royale in Belgium. From 1998 to 2001, he instructed one of the concert pianists' classes at the University of Music in Vienna. He is also regularly invited on juries for international piano competitions such as the Queen Elisabeth and the Marguerite Long-Jacques Thibaud.

A total command of the keyboard allied with an insatiable curiosity allow David Lively to master all styles from the Renaissance to music of today and to perform such monuments as Bach's entire Art of the Fugue. During the last three years devoted particularly to teaching, David Lively has given great consideration to the role of the keyboard in the history of music. This has led to a redefinition of his role as virtuoso and the development of several unique projects.

One of these is the rediscovery of the Romantic Chamber Concerto, a remarkably well developed genre in the early 19th century particularly in France. Study of this repertoire has led to the re-edition and performance of several works, better known in their more amplified versions, and the discovery of little-known or only recently republished works. David Lively is proposing programmes to discover this repertoire with the accompaniment of string quintets playing on period instruments.

Another innovative project of great potential is the new technique Prismorphism comprising a new approach to interpretive performing developed by David Lively. Following an installation-performance in collaboration with his colleague Jean-Baptiste Barriere, composer and former research director at IRCAM, David Lively is working on the development of electronic interpretation. This installation-performance, involving synthesizer and computer programming, is conceived for realisation in inspiring architectural sites permitting spatial sonic effects combined with visual projection of Impressionistic masterpieces. An important objective of this work is the use of these new techniques to attract and convince a larger and more general audience.

Quatuor Cambini-Paris
Formed in 2007, the Quatuor Cambini-Paris, one of the rare string quartets to play on period instruments, has quickly established itself in today’s musical landscape thanks to the richness of its repertoire.

The quartet is admired for both its performances of the acknowledged masterpieces of Haydn, Mozart, Beethoven and Mendelssohn and its rediscovery of forgotten French composers such as Jadin, David and Gouvy.

In order to reproduce as closely as possible the musical conditions which the composers knew in their day, the Quatuor Cambini-Paris plays on instruments strung with gut and uses bows appropriate to each epoch.

By choosing the name of Giuseppe Maria Cambini (1746-1825), a violinist and composer of 155 string quartets, the Quatuor Cambini-Paris bears witness to its interest in exploring the stylistic developments of the Classical and Romantic periods.

The quartet has performed in the most renowned venues and festivals, including the Frick Collection in New York, the Philips Collection in Washington, DC, the Salle Bourgie in the Montreal Museum of Fine Arts, the Palazzetto Bru Zane in Venice, the Marble Palace in St Petersburg, the Opéra Comique, Auditorium du Louvre and Musée d’Orsay in Paris, Versailles Palace (Centre de Musique Baroque de Versailles), the Théâtre de Caen, the Arsenal in Metz, the Concertgebouw in Bruges, the Amuz Music Centre in Antwerp, De Bijloke in Ghent, the French Institutes in Vienna and Budapest, and the festivals of Deauville, Sablé-sur-Sarthe, L’Épau, Radio France Occitanie Montpellier, Saintes and Newbury.

The recordings of the Quatuor Cambini-Paris have enjoyed critical acclaim, with such awards as 4 stars in Classica, ffff Télérama, Diapason ‘Découverte’, ‘Disc of the Month’ in Classic Voice and ‘Coup de Cœur’ in the radio programme Carrefour de Lodéon and Concertclassic as well. They include Mozart’s six ‘Haydn’ Quartets (Ambroisie-Naïve), works by Théodore Gouvy (CD-book Palazzetto Bru Zane), Félicien David (Ambroisie-Naïve) and Hyacinthe Jadin (Timpani) and a contribution to the set ‘200 Years of Music at Versailles’ (MBF).

The quartet’s chamber music partners include such eminent artists as Nicolas Baldeyrou, Kristian Bezuidenhout, Christophe Coin, Jean-François Heisser, David Lively, Jérôme Pernoo ou Alain Planès.

Since June 2016, the Quatuor Cambini-Paris has performed on four historical instruments, on loan as part of the project ‘Adopt a Musician’, an initiative of MusicMasterpieces at Lugano: a violin by Francesco Pressenda (1841), a violin by Giuseppe Rocca (1839), a viola by Giuseppe Rocca (1855) and a cello by Antonio Guadagnini (1881).

At the start of the 2016/17 season, the Quatuor Cambini-Paris embarked on the ambitious project of performing all 68 string quartets of Joseph Haydn at the Théâtre de Caen over a period of eight years. These concerts, presented by Clément Lebrun, allow the audience to join the musicians in a participatory and sensory experience.

The Quatuor Cambini-Paris is supported by the French Ministry of Culture and Communication, the Région Île-de-France, the Caisse des Dépôts (principal sponsor), the Banque de France, the endowment fund Françoise Kahn-Hamm, the association Adopt a Musician and the Club Olympe sponsors. It is associate artist at the Singer-Polignac Foundation in Paris. The Palazzetto Bru Zane (Centre de Musique Romantique Française) in Venice enjoys a special rapport with them.

Booklet for Chopin: Concertos for Piano & String Quintet