Hélène Grimaud

Hélène Grimaud is a pianist who defies womanly stereotypes. Her preferred repertory continues to be Brahms, Beethoven, Rachmaninov, Schumann, and Liszt, not really the much less muscular music of Mozart (which she didn’t perform until she was 21 or record until 2010), Poulenc, or Chopin. Grimaud’s lush audio and sweeping interpretations drew evaluations to such pianists as Martha Argerich and Jorge Bolet. An “agitated and agitating” kid by her very own admission, Grimaud began learning the piano at nine on the Aix Conservatoire, merely as a route on her behalf surplus energy. After just 3 years, she could play Schumann’s Papillons, the initial motion of Beethoven’s Waldstein Sonata, and Fauré’s Barcarolle No. 5 impressively, and she got into the Paris Conservatory at 13. There, as an impatient and rebellious pupil of Jacques Rouvier, Genevieve Pleasure, and Christian Ivaldi, she insisted on learning repertory at a quicker pace compared to the conservatory allowed; on her behalf own, she organized to try out the Chopin Concerto in F small using the conservatory orchestra back Aix when she was 14. Rouvier, impressed, offered a tape of this concert to a maker for Denon which company, initially not really realizing Grimaud’s age group, documented her in Rachmaninov’s Sonata No. 2 and Etudes-Tableaux, Op. 33. That Compact disc garnered a Grand Prix du Disque; Grimaud was just 16. In 1987 she started playing concerts beyond your conservatory, including an engagement at age group 18 with Daniel Barenboim as well as the Orchestre de Paris (just her fourth open public concert). She maintains friendships with Barenboim, Martha Argerich, and Gidon Kremer and significantly admires the task of Vladimir Horowitz and Glenn Gould. Grimaud stocks Gould’s desire for very clear counterpoint and Argerich’s and Kremer’s general strength. However her treatment of Brahms, for instance, avoids attention-getting extremes of tempo and rather follows what she’s known as a “pulsation that’s extremely near to the ideal heartbeat,” while also clarifying the textures. She actually is willing to consider risks in overall performance, but just the ones that she feels illuminate the music instead of limelight the soloist. In Rachmaninov, she stresses what she phone calls the music’s “nobility of center” and lyricism instead of its virtuosity. She’s continued a occupied schedule of worldwide performances with a number of the world’s most exclusive orchestras, concentrating on concertos of Beethoven, Rachmaninov, Brahms, Schumann, Ravel, and Bartók. Like a recitalist she’s toured with repertoire like the functions of Arvo Pärt, John Corigliano, Beethoven, Chopin, Schumann, and Brahms. Grimaud cites an appearance in the Last Night from the Proms in 2008 as an individual spotlight of her profession.