ALC 0092 Respighi: Piano Sonata, 6 Pieces for Piano, Ancient Airs and Dances

Best known for his symphonic poems dedicated to Rome (the Trilogia romana) and certainly remembered for the mastery he achieved in his orchestral transcriptions of J.S. Bach's Passacaglia BWV 581 and S. Rachmaninoff's Études-Tableaux, Respighi dedicated an extraordinary production to the piano that has been unjustly neglected in concert halls. The entire piano corpus is characterised by formal refinement, elegance of content and timbre refinement. Critic Isotta defines Respighi as a 'poeta dotto': the love for the ancient mode becomes a deep emotional canvas on which the chromatic harmonies of the 20th century gravitate, with references to Debussy and Duparc.