The music of Italian pianist/composer Ludovico Einaudi, poised between Glass' minimalism and the shifting shades of the ambient movement, has gained more traction in Europe than in the Western hemisphere. That could change with this release by Canadian violinist Angèle Dubeau and her chamber orchestra (with piano), La Pietà. Dubeau and François Vallières have arranged a variety of Einaudi's pieces, most of them at his typical length of four or five minutes, for the violin-and-orchestra combination. Thoughts on it will ...
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The music of Italian pianist/composer Ludovico Einaudi, poised between Glass' minimalism and the shifting shades of the ambient movement, has gained more traction in Europe than in the Western hemisphere. That could change with this release by Canadian violinist Angèle Dubeau and her chamber orchestra (with piano), La Pietà. Dubeau and François Vallières have arranged a variety of Einaudi's pieces, most of them at his typical length of four or five minutes, for the violin-and-orchestra combination. Thoughts on it will depend largely on what some think of Einaudi's music to begin with. For those who are new to it, start with one of Einaudi's own recordings. The music of the general minimalist orbit usually stands up well to being arranged -- think of the multiple versions of Arvo Pärt's major works, where such adaptability is almost a hallmark of the style -- but Einaudi is so oriented toward the spaces inside the notes of a solo piano that you might think this version dilutes it a bit. On the other...
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