George Perle: Piano Works
Liner Notes   Cat. No. 80342     Release Date: 1987-01-01

Michael Boriskin, piano

George Perle's affection for the piano began in childhood, when he first heard the instrument: He speaks with precise recall of the very moment when he became entranced at age of six listening to the first of the Trois nouvelles etudes of Chopin. While he has created a rich and important list of works in nearly every medium except opera over the past half-century, he has composed more for the piano (in both its solo and chamber roles) than for any other instrument. His keyboard canon now includes a dozen etudes in two collections, one set of preludes, a suite, two brief sonatas and a sonatina, a variety of individual pieces, and two large chamber works which prominently feature the piano (the Concertino and Serenade No. 3).

In 1986, Perle received the Pulitzer Prize in music and a MacArthur Foundation Fellowship— honors, confirming his belated emergence as one of today's most distinguished composers. This disc features one of Perle's earliest surviving compositions Pantomime, Interlude and Fugue (1937). Also included are his 1971 Fantasy-Variations, which combine an improvisational (but precisely notated) musical rhetoric with a more tightly structured variation format; Six New Etudes (1984), a companion set to Perle's immensely successful Six Etudes of 1976 (recorded by Bradford Gowen on NW 304); Suite in C (1970), and the fiendishly difficult Short Sonata (1964).

Michael Boriskin

George Perle: Piano Works

MP3/320 $16.00
FLAC $16.00
WAV $16.00
CD $25.00

Track Listing

Pantomime, Interlude, and Fugue: I. Pantomime
George Perle
Buy
Pantomime, Interlude, and Fugue: II. Interlude
George Perle
Buy
Pantomime, Interlude, and Fugue: III. Fugue
George Perle
Buy
Fantasy-Variations
George Perle
Buy
Six New Etudes: I. Praeludium
George Perle
Buy
Six New Etudes: II. Gigue
George Perle
Buy
Six New Etudes: III. Papillons
George Perle
Buy
Six New Etudes: IV. Romance
George Perle
Buy
Six New Etudes: V. Variations
George Perle
Buy
Six New Etudes: VI. Perpetuum mobile
George Perle
Buy
Suite in C: I. Introduction
George Perle
Buy
Suite in C: II. Cycles
George Perle
Buy
Suite in C: III. Chinese Puzzle
George Perle
Buy
Suite in C: IV. Improvisation
George Perle
Buy
Suite in C: V. Toccata
George Perle
Buy
Short Sonata (first part)
George Perle
Buy
Short Sonata (second part)
George Perle
Buy
Short Sonata (third part)
George Perle
Buy