“Après un rêve” is an ode to the French Belle Époque repertoire, depicting the beauty of dreams and the night. The album is an opportunity to hear and perhaps discover rarely played / rarely recorded wonderful works (Chaminade Nocturne, Duparc Aux étoiles, Poulenc Les soirées de Nazelles), alongside central pillars of the repertoire, and includes a world premiere of Despax’s arrangement of Après un rêve. The album is attributed to his grandfather, Jacques Charpentreau, a French poet who adored this repertoire and frequently drew inspiration from the night in his works. Despax has curated some of his poetry, as well as works by other poets he admired to complement this music, taking the listener on an immersive poetic and musical journey through this noctur- nal landscape.

REVIEW:

Despax has recorded Bach, Brahms, Chopin, but the works here particularly suit his sensibility. In Maurice Ravel’s haunting masterpiece Gaspard de la Nuit, he masters the ferocious challenges with ease, delicacy, strength.

-- The Guardian (UK)

This recording received a 1998 "Critic's Choice" award from Gramophone magazine.

"Yes, the pundits were right. This is the Rachmaninov Third to end all Rachmaninov Thirds, a performance of such super-human pianistic aplomb, pace and virtuosity that it makes all comparisons, save with Horowitz himself...a study in irrelevance...The ultimate wizard of the keyboard is in expansive mood in the Tchaikovsky...The perfomance ends in what I can only describe as a scream of octaves and an outburst by an audience driven near to hysteria." - Gramophone

Historic record of the year. (1998) - Classic CD - (Recordings from 1940 & 1941.)

Vladimir Horowitz's concerts are the stuff of legends. An excellent showman in addition to being one of the greatest pianists of all time, he always had an answer to the applause and requests for encores. ENCORES is a collection of some of the pieces he prepared for such occasions.
These selections include some of more crowd-pleasing pieces from the classical repertoire, five of which were transcribed for piano by Horowitz himself. The inclusion of "Danse macabre" and "Wedding March and Variations" illustrate his popular approach to encores. His gift for dramatic flourish is particularly evident in the tracks recorded in concert. Horowitz had an uncanny knack for playing off of an audience while performing even the most technically complex pieces. Concluding with his transcription of John Philip Sousa's "Stars and Stripes Forever," this album is a tribute to one of the pianists--and showmen--of the century.