Tuesday, August 19, 2008

RAVEL: La Valse

Maurice Ravel's brilliant tribute to the Viennese Waltz: La Valse. The waltz gradually emerges from a haze, barely recognizable in the beginning, with snatches here and there of the melody, but slowly becoming coherent and finally revealing itself in all its grand glory. The music pays tribute to Vienna at the height of its power as the centre of the vast Austro-Hungarian Empire.





Interpreted splendidly by the Russian pianist Pavel Nersessian. I have never heard of him, but most pianists who attempted this had massive difficulties with this finger-breaker, especially towards the end where the dissonance can be disconcerting.

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