Giacinto Scelsi: Piano Works 4

"Stephen Clarke, a Canadian pianist who revels in the challenges of difficult new music, played a concert at Le Poisson Rouge on Monday evening to celebrate the release of 'Giacinto Scelsi: Piano Works 4,' his latest contribution to the Mode label’s CD series devoted to this idiosyncratic Italian composer’s music. ... Listeners who associate Scelsi with the spare, often gnomic works of his final two decades (he died in 1988) would have found the 10-movement Suite No. 5 ('Il Circo,' 1935) and 'Hispania' (1939) puzzlingly uncharacteristic. In these Scelsi is outgoing, energetic, at times picturesque. To capture a Spanish sensibility, in 'Hispania,' for example, he wove references to delicate guitar figuration into his otherwise forceful piano writing, and borrowed a flamenco move — gradually speeding up a repeating chord progression — while keeping his distance from this music’s traditional harmonies and themes" (Allan Kozinn, "Pianist Revels in Scores That Dare the Ear," New York Times, 1/4/11).
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