18.10.19

My Uncle, Harpsichordist: Session 006 (Jean Françaix)


I grew up with the records of my uncle’s (him performing, that is)—most memorably Scarlatti sonatas and some baroque sonatas for harpsichord and recorder. A few years ago I stumbled across a stack of copied CDs—taken from those out-of-print LPs and home-recordings—and grabbed them for memory’s sake. To my great intrigue, I found several discs devoted to works from the 20th century… which made me realize what a pity it is that I never talked about music with my uncle.

It might just be of interest to present the tracks of these recordings here, as a little personal musical (living) memorial. He was, after all, a formative person in my life, impressing on a kid of five, six, seven years the joys of collecting and tasting wine, eating and enjoying mushrooms and zucchini (garlic was the key to my palate then and it still is), and… Scarlatti.

Here’s track №.6:



Jean Françaix (1912-1997), L’insectarium pour Cembalo: Les Fourmis | Die Ameisen | Ants (2:20)
Performance by Detlef Goetz-Laurson, 1980



Score: Schott
Commercial Recording: N/A (Apart from an OOP 7-inch single by Marga Scheurich)
Premiered in 1957, by Wanda Landowska.
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2 comments:

  1. AnonymousNovember 23, 2019 11:12 AM

    Hello, Jens,

    As I read this review cum sign-off by Anne Midgette in the Washington Post this morning I wondered if you might consider taking the music reviewer's position at the paper.

    https://www.washingtonpost.com/entertainment/music/its-my-last-review-as-the-posts-classical-music-critic-here-are-my-parting-thoughts-on-the-nso/2019/11/22/112053c6-0d3e-11ea-bd9d-c628fd48b3a0_story.html

    Thanks for all your wonderful commentary on IonArts.

    Keep up the great work.

    Best,
    Tom
    in Baltimore

    ReplyDelete
  2. jflMarch 01, 2020 8:59 AM

    Dear Tom,

    thanks kindly for the flattering comment. I think I'd be among the absolute last persons that the WPost would consider for the job, even if I still lived in the region.

    In fact, I don't think I would even be particularly good at it. Nowadays, you have to churn out clickbait... and that's not really my thing.

    I'll just humbly continue slogging it out for places like ClassicsToday and WienerZeitung, here, locally.

    But again: thanks & thanks for sweet comments. It's very pleasant to read that even just one person might think that way.

    Cheers & best,

    Jens

    ReplyDelete