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06.01.2022 #baroque #classical #contemporary #jazz #kulturlxnews

Gazette Corner - Jazz/World/ Classical/Contemporary

Luxembourgish artists are in the international press. Excerpts.

Cathy Krier, Etudes pour Piano, Ligeti
Award-winner of the Global Project Grant 2021 – Classical music, Cathy Krier has released the integral recording of Ligeti’s Études pour piano, on August 27th under CAvi-music.

Concentrated, but never tense, and taking sparkling delight in this stylistically and intellectually unpredictable piano music, she masters these pieces beautifully. Even in resting phases when Ligeti retreats into post-impressionism, Krier shows class and dexterity there too.” – Rondo

These pieces are among the most significant pieces for solo piano after the Second World War. Have they ever been performed more expressively than by Cathy Krier?” – Fono Forum

[Cathy Krier’s] interpretations are sensual, vital, colourful and exciting. […] The artistic importance of  this Ligeti’s masterpiece has never been clearer.” – Wiener Zeitung

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Benjamin Kruithof, Russian Mood
First Prize winner of the National Cello Competition in Amsterdam, cellist Benjamin Kruithof released his debut CD Russian Mood on the ArsProduktion label on 3 September. Recorded with the Nordwestdeutsche Philharmonie under the direction of Conrad van Alphen, the CD features works by Tchaikovsky, Glasunov, Davidov, Popper and Rachmaninov.

For his first album, Kruithof has chosen the Russian repertoire: works by Rachmaninov and Tchaikovsky, Glazumov, Karl David Dawidow and David Popper. And he presents himself here as an intimate interpreter, entirely devoted to the expression of great feeling.” – ö1

Benjamin Kruithof and his cello play smoothly play through all the moods of Russian music. When you start listening, you quickly find yourself in the wake of his cello – and in the process you discover the extent of its expressive power. With “Russian Mood”, the young cellist has achieved a musical exclamation point.” – Hessischer Rundfunk 2

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Sabine Weyer, Mysteries
Sabine Weyer has released a CD on ARS Produktion label entitled Mysteries, which combines the music of the Russian/Soviet composer Nikolai Myaskovsky (1881-1950) with the one of the contemporary French composer Nicolas Bacri (born 1961).

Sabine Weyer is the ideal interpreter of these neighbouring aesthetics: her performance allows the fire that often smoulders under the ice to come to the fore, without giving into pathos. A beautiful album“. – Classica

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Jean Muller, Mozart Piano Sonatas, Vol. 3

Jean Muller continues his complete collection of Mozart’s piano sonatas with the release of a third volume, which includes four new sonatas: sonatas No. 2, No. 8, No. 10 and No. 16.

The third volume is released today and presents four new sonatas with the same interpretative guidelines as before: to highlight Mozart’s dramatic genius. Without forgetting his humour!” – France Musique

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Francesco Tristano
2022 Award-Winner of the Global Project Grant in the classical/contemporary music category, Francesco Tristano released his new album on early music on 4 February 2022 (Sony Classical).

Tristano, alone at the piano – surrounded by three small radiators! – has given himself over to the delicate exercise of a sound recording session. From Orlando Gibbons to Girolamo Frescobaldi, he brought these composers to life with a very contemporary grace. It is perhaps with his own compositions, unveiled in preview, that Francesco Tristano best succeeds in bringing together his passions for electro and classical music. While waiting for the release of the album “On Early Music” in the coming months, this concert can be found online as a suspende.d moment” – Les Echos

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Arthur Possing
Natural Flow is the second album of Arthur Possing Quartet. In the continuity of their first album Four years, this new opus (released on Double Moon Records/Challenge Records) explores numerous compositions with innovative and researched sounds, which gives it new aesthetic.

Release of the week” – Le Soir

One can sense various influences – from Coltrane to Mehldau – but it clearly has its own contours and an original and striking force” – Jazzthing

A collection with a resolutely modern sound, at the crossroads between jazz and pop, and moreover recorded in Peter Gabriel’s studios in England” – Disque du jour on TSF Jazz

Even more than his piano playing, where one can feel the heritage of the greats perfectly digested, it is the whole that convinces by its organic aspect, its fluidity and its intensity… A promising musician to follow” – Jazz Mag

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Michel Meis
Award-winner of the Global Project Grant 2021 in the jazz section, the Michel Meis 4TET released itsalbum Kaboom on 28 May 2021 on Double Moon/Challenge Records.

Post-modern jazz with an electro-pop flavour” – Citizen Jazz (FR)

“A flirt with ever-changing forms of energy, bound in a jazz setting, but driven by the crossover of attitudes.” – Jazz thing (DE)

“An album full of contrasts, a masterpiece of lively and versatile jazz”. – Rolling Stone (FR)

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Greg Lamy
After the success of his two previous albums Meeting in 2013 and Press Enter in 2017, Greg Lamy presents his new album Observe the Silence, released on 30 April 2021.

Lamy makes music that caresses the soul, without being superficial” – Jazzthetik

This 47 year old Luxembourger has an impeccable technique, but also a sense of melody: enough to make each note vibrate, weightless in an atmosphere made softly magnetic...” – L’OBS

When he plays at moderate tempos, Greg Lamy has no age or country. He is only a sensitivity that expresses itself, as if by fluidity” – Télérama

There is in this album a kind of permanent groove, fluidity, flow, clarity, necessity that fills the listener with emotion and happiness” – Le Soir

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Reis/Demuth/Wiltgen
Released on February 26, 2021, the trio Reis-Demuth-Wiltgen received an excellent reception for the release of their album SLY

Virtuoso Foxes Reis/Demuth/Wiltgen, the Luxembourg tio, present “Sly”, their new album. It can be confirmed that it is a real joy to listen to when these three come out of their lair.” – TDF Jazz

This Luxembourg piano trio works like a well-oiled machine, and no wonder…” – Jazzthetik

…the musical race of the Luxembourg trio goes through territories, dialects, phrasing, the popular, the human mirror which they inevitably play with their weapons, the instruments and a rhythmic power that no border stops.” – Couleurs Jazz

Well in tune with the times, the trio combines classical or impressionist influences with pop, even a harmonic lyricism à la Enrico Peranunzi.” –  Jazz Mag

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Klein
After a first acclaimed EP in 2018, the band KLEIN, led by Jérôme Klein, released their album SONDER on the French label Cristal Records on 10 December 2021.

TOP MEZZO album from January 2022

…despite its name, it is already a great band. Because it brings a different note, and not just a blue one, to today’s jazz.” –  Le Soir