For his latest release on Sony Classical, pianist Lucas Debargue turns to one of the unsung treasuries of the piano repertoire: the works of Gabriel Fauré.
In a remarkable undertaking, Debargue has recorded every note of his compatriot’s piano music, all on a newly designed piano rarely heard on record until now. Throughout each recording, he retraced Fauré's musical path, from his earliest works to his final compositions. "Recording it," says the pianist, has "transformed my life both as a person and as a musician."
Debargue’s recording of Fauré’s complete piano works is a major recording event of the Fauré anniversary, commemorating the 100th anniversary of the composer’s death in 1924. A comprehensive set of sleeve notes notes includes the pianist’s own commentary on each piece, an analysis of Fauré’s approach to writing for the piano, and full details of the Paulello Opus 102 instrument he plays on the recordings.
After acclaimed recordings of music by the great masters, Lucas Debargue shines much-needed light on a composer he is determined must be heard: Milosz Magin (1929 – 1999). ‘Magin’s style is capable of both enchanting and surprising us,’ the French pianist says. ‘Few composers of his time were so open to cultivating the art of writing beautiful melodies.’ Born in Poland in 1929, Magin settled in Paris in 1960. After a car accident in 1963 he traded a career as one of Poland’s greatest pianists for that of an imaginative composer who would never forget the traditions of his homeland. Magin’s greatest inspiration was Chopin, another Pole who made Paris his home and whose piano works Magin recorded for Decca. The two composers are buried next to one another in Paris. Magin’s music shares much of the same lucid, distilled quality as that of his forbear, as well as a pianistic elegance that speaks of France and Poland in equal measure. ‘His music has been resonating in my mind’s ear for the last twenty years,’ says Debargue, whose first piano teacher was a student of Magin and ‘admired him not only as an inspired composer but also as a pianist and as a teacher whose advice on interpretative matters had often proved invaluable to her. His music has played a crucial role in my life. I grew up with it’, continues the French pianist. The pieces written for children, especially Magin’s Miniature Polonaises of which he presents Nostalgie du pays, were one of the first works he learnt with his first piano teacher. When Debargue included Magin’s Nostalgie du pays at a recital in Paris, the composer’s granddaughter Alexandra contacted him. A correspondence began and a world of unpublished music saw the light of day.TRACKLIST1. Andante pour violon et piano Concerto No. 3 pour piano, cordes et percussions 2. I. Allegro con fuoco - Allegro Appassionato 3. II. Allegro 4. III. Presto 5. IV. Adagio 6. V. Allegro con fuoco 7. Vocalise No. 2 - Andantino 8. Vocalise No. 3 - Vivace 9. Nostalgie du pays, extrait des Miniatures Polonaises Concerto Rustico pour violon, cordes et percussions 10. I. Allegro 11. II. Andantino 12. III. Presto 13. Vocalise No. 1 - Andante 14. Vocalise No. 4 - Andantino 15. Stabat Mater pour cordes et timbales
Mozart: Ecstasy & Abyss / Fröst, Debargue, Swedish Chamber Orchestra
Sony Masterworks
CD
$8.49$16.98Save 50%Mar 31, 2023
Double-album project that represents the dualities in Mozart's music and life - light versus shade, human verses divine, life versus death, playful versus profound, disaster versus triumph. The 1st album focuses on the repertoire of a concert Mozart gave in Leipzig in May 1789 in a very difficult period in his life. The 2nd enters around a final trip to his beloved Prague (Aug. 1791) where his opera, Clemenza di Tito, was premiered and he conceived his Clarinet Concerto, having presented his Prague Symphony there some years earlier.
This is Martin Frost's 3rd recording of this work and is performed here on Mozart's favorite instrument, the Basset Clarinet. This also includes the first recordings of Frost conducting.
“Every performance of a work is its own statement, contains its own truth…. This release marks exactly 20 years, almost a generation, since my first recording of the work, and exactly 10 years since my second. The world has changed immeasurably in that time. I have changed, both as an artist and as a person. And we change as listeners.” - Martin Frost
In two virtuosic parts, the brilliant and internationally renowned pianist Lucas Debargue reinterprets-and even reimagines-the repertoire of the illustrious American composer George Gershwin in a unique and personal way. The first part of the album, recorded during a memorable evening at the Philharmonie de Paris in September 2025 on Stephen Paulello's unique SP/287 piano, features the famous Three Preludes and Concerto in F, accompanied by the Orchestre de Paris conducted by Elim Chan. Also included: a highly personal version of Rhapsody in Blue, enriched with the pianist's own cadenzas. The second part, recorded at the Paulello Studio, is entirely devoted to twelve virtuosic etudes composed by Lucas from Gershwin's most popular songs, spanning all chromatic keys. This cycle represents the most ambitious creation of his career as a pianist to date, affirming a deep commitment to freedom and invention, while placing itself in the tradition of the great composers who wrote their own etudes. Gershwin's most celebrated works appear reimagined: The Man I Love, Someone to Watch Over Me, Ain't Necessarily So, They Can't Take That Away From Me, I Got Rhythm plus 20 variations on the theme of Summertime! Internationally acclaimed pianist Lucas Debargue's Gershwin Variations stand as an ambitious and unprecedented project, born from the desire to explore a radically different universe after recording Scarlatti sonatas and the complete solo piano works of Faure. This double album is an ode to George Gershwin, an unclassifiable composer standing at the crossroads of classical music and jazz, whose singularity inspired Lucas to create a work equally impossible to categorize. The Gershwin Variations is neither a classical album nor a jazz album, but a hybrid work reflecting the anticonformist spirit and the American dream embodied by Gershwin. Lucas offers a bold and poetic reinterpretation in which counterpoint, shifting harmonies, and unconventional rhythms reveal the richness of Gershwin's melodies. He invites listeners to rediscover a repertoire where popularity is never synonymous with triviality, and where music becomes a space for freedom, daring, and vitality.
Lucas Debargue’s third recording presents sonatas by Franz Schubert and polish composer Karol Szymanowski (1882 – 1937) Besides recording Schubert's famous Sonatas No.13 & No.14 the pianist continues to dedicate his musicianship to composers and works left in the shadow and presents Karol Szymanowski “I think it makes more sense to devote myself to an astonishing but little-known work, than it does to focus on pieces that people have heard too often.” – Lucas Debargue about Nicolai Medtner’s piano sonata, recorded on his last release Lucas Debargue has always been far off the beaten track, starting with his unusually late musical career to his interpretation of works where he widens the boundaries of the norm “Anyone who complains about uniformity in today’s music business will find the greatest pleasure in Debargue. He is different.” – NDR, Germany. “ Lucas Debargue takes the music beyond the accepted norm, questioning the status quo with a fresh perspective” - San Francisco Classical Voice. “Debargue is fantastically gifted: original, not tamed by any academicism, eccentric to the point of being mannered, but also thrilling as a result of his very personal tone.”– Frankfurter Allgemeine Zeitung
