SKU: HL.49046383

ISBN 9790001207454. UPC: 842819106098. 9.0x12.0x0.074 inches.

Chapter 11 of James Joyce's Ulysses is a real treasure trove of existing and invented words and names; each word and name triggers off a whole series of associations, images, stories and sounds - particularly when the reader is a Hungarian composer who comes across the phrase “Liszt's rhapsodies”. I immediately heard music by Franz Liszt in my head and visualised the two protagonists in the novel sitting on a terrace drinking coffee, chatting and dreaming, witty and endearing - which is also a perfect description of this small piano composition for four hands. Peter Eötvös.

SKU: HL.49047113

ISBN 9781705189269. UPC: 842819117520. 0.096 inches.

The final movement of the Sonata in A major K. 331 by Wolfgang Amadeus Mozart, the Rondo Alla Turca, is one of the most famous pianopieces of all. Once reserved for all music connoisseurs, later played by every piano student, its opening melody, alienated like a sine tone, is now omnipresent even as a mobile phone ringtone. The arrangement by Fazil Say, created as an effective encore, builds on this popularity. Mounted on the still recognizable classic basic level, typical jazz elements such as syncopation of the top tones and embellishment with chromatic blue notes, embedded in sometimes frenzied chains of sixteenth notes, are found - after the first eight bars have been presented originally. In accordance with the improvisational character, Say himself likes to perform his Alla Turca Jazz in other combinations, for example with the accompaniment of jazz singers or with an orchestra. Perhaps it is surprising that Fazil Say, who was born in Turkey and lives there when not on tour, does not trace Mozart's adaptation of genuinely Turkish music closer to its origins, since many of his compositions such as Black Earth or the Violin Sonata are characterized by a subtle touch Combination of classic-romantic tradition, Turkish folk music and jazz elements. In another Mozart arrangement, the ballet music Patara, which premiered in Vienna in 2006, but now composed on the rococo-esque (and almost equally popular) theme from the first movement of the same A major sonata, Say still has the connection denied to the Alla Turca, albeit inthe opposite direction. In distinctive chamber music instrumentation, the piano stands for Western culture, the ney flute for that of the Orient, atmospherically conveyed by sparse percussion and vocalises by a soprano.

SKU: HL.49045047

ISBN 9790001127066. UPC: 888680735203. 9.0x12.0x0.065 inches.

This short piece for piano for four hands was inspired by a small painting by Alfred Sisley from the Musee de Rouen, which shows a sea wave in a Welsh coastal landscape. Pecou composed this work for his son and grandfather, for both are pianists.