Antonio Pompa-Baldi - Romantic Piano - COMPACT DISCS [CD]

Antonio Pompa-Baldi - Sonatas [COMPACT DISCS] date 11/25/2003

This is Volume 3 in Centaur's cycle of the complete piano sonatas of Hummel, performed by Antonio Pompa-Baldi. This cycle is setting a very high bar for complete Hummel sonata cycles. Born and raised in Foggia, Italy, Antonio Pompa-Baldi won the Cleveland International Piano Competition in 1999 and embarked on a career that continues to extend across five continents. He also won a silver medal at the 2001 Van Cliburn Competition, as well as a bronze medal at the 1998 Marguerite Long Competition in Paris. The New York Times described his playing as Inchmeltingly beautiful.Inch Pompa-Baldi founded the Todi International Music Masters Festival, of which he is artistic director and faculty member, and sits on the juries of the most prestigious piano competitions in the world.

Salzedo has done for the harp what Bach did for the organ, Paganini for the violin, Chopin, Liszt and Debussy for the piano, which is to enlarge the technical and expressive potentialities of their chosen instruments. These are the words of the great conductor Leopold Stokowski when writing about the figure of Carlos Salzedo, who was born in Arcachon, France, in 1885 and died in Waterville, U.S.A., in 1961. A tireless organizer, performer of the harp and piano, and conductor, Salzedo was the co-founder with Edgard Varèse of the International Composers' Guild (active from 1921 to 1927). He was also a member of the International Society for Contemporary Music and of countless other prestigious associations his desire to promote the music of new composers and to inform the public remained constant throughout his whole life. The programme presented here provides the opportunity to couple the broad soundscape of the Variations sur un theme dans le style ancien (1911), marked by a virtuosity aimed at exhibiting all the resources offered by the instrument, with a more intimate collection like the Five Preludes of 1917, then concluding with the Suite of Eight Dances composed in 1943.