Ensemble Raro/Apap - George Enescu: Impressions d'enfance

Impressions d�enfance, Ensemble Raro�s and Gilles Apap�s new CD recording, is dedicated to chamber music works of George Enescu. Piano Quintet in D is one of his earliest compositions. Written in 1896 at the age of fifteen during his studies at the Paris Conservatoire, it is certainly inspired by Brahms� chamber works. Enescu himself confessed about Brahms� enormous influence on his development : �the God of my youthful adoration is Brahms and I wrote my early works in the style of the immortal Johannes in an almost flagrant way�. The Quintet was premiered in 1897, in Enescu�s first recital of his own works in Paris at the age of sixteen; Massenet and Cortot were in the audience. The two charming works for Piano and String Trio, Aubade and Serenade Lointaine, illustrate the point that Enescu�s beloved teacher Gabriel Faur� expressed very beautifully: �the greatest technical ability is not worth anything without poetry�. Even in the cleverly constructed short piece Hommage for Piano, which is based on a motive representing the letters of Faur�s name, the poetic, dreamy quality prevails. Enescu�s late masterpiece Impressions d�enfance for Violin and Piano takes us back to the very first occasion when three year old George heard a street fiddler for the very first time. Impressions is an evocation of a childhood through a sequence of dreams, memories, imperceptible sensations and sounds. It results in one of Enescu�s most glorious climaxes where the old fiddler�s tune merges with cosmic piano harmony and the the noble, healing force of music triumphs over all. In Enescu�s own words: a man always �carries the music in himself. In the loneliness of the mountains and plains, it is his comrade; it calms his fears, it helps him sing his dor, that inexpressible nostalgia that breaks his soul�.