Broadway-Lafayette
Artist: Simone Dinnerstein
Release Date: February 24, 2015
Label: Sony Classical
The music on this album celebrates the time-honored transatlantic link between France and America through the music of George Gershwin (Rhapsody in Blue), Maurice Ravel (Piano Concerto in G Major), and Philip Lasser (The Circle and the Child: Concerto for Piano and Orchestra, written for Dinnerstein). The album was recorded with conductor Kristjan Järvi and the MDR Leipzig Radio Symphony Orchestra by Grammy-winning producer Adam Abeshouse.
Of Broadway-Lafayette, Simone says, “Over the centuries, France and America have influenced and supported each other in many ways, and this music explores the link between the two cultures. George Gerswhin is the quintessential American composer. He immortalized his own trip to France in An American in Paris, and his music broaches aesthetic boundaries in a way that few other composers have managed – he combines the tunefulness and syncopation of jazz and popular music with the rich harmonies and rhythmic creativity of high art. Gershwin’s Rhapsody in Blue is particularly present in Ravel’s Piano Concerto in G Major, written in 1929, the year after Ravel met Gershwin while on tour in the U.S. Philip Lasser, this album’s living composer, is the son of a French mother and an American father, and grew up in a bilingual household. His musical voice is an amalgam of both worlds, circling around Bach’s sun. His piano concerto, written for me in 2012, incorporates the Bach Chorale 'Ihr Gestirn, ihr hohen Lüfte.' The work explores ideas of travel and discovery, and of memory and return.”