Kantorow/Tapiola/Kantorow - Camille Saint-Sa�ns: Piano Concertos 3, 4 & 5 'L'�gyptien'

Jean-Jacques Kantorow and the Tapiola Sinfonietta have championed the music of Saint-Sa�ns on a series of acclaimed discs, and are now joined by the young Alexandre Kantorow �son of the conductor � for a survey of his works for piano and orchestra. In 1858, Saint-Sa�ns became the first major French composer to write a piano concerto, but on this first disc of two the Kantorows present the three last concertos. Composed over a period of almost 30 years (1868 � 1896), these are highly individual works: Piano Concerto No. 3 is a bold attempt to reconcile Classical form with a Lisztian pianistic brio, No. 4 employs an unusual formal scheme in which themes are reused in a cyclic manner and, finally, the �Egyptian� (No. 5), named after the second movement, which in the composer�s own words describes �a sort of Eastern journey that goes all the way to the Far East�.