20 FAURÉ ∙ NOCTURNES All the same, you devoted your first solo recording to Beethoven. Why did you keep Fauré waiting? I also feel a very strong bond with the music of Beethoven. Its structure is easier to grasp, and its clear, direct language seemed to me to be better suited to a first recording. Things are quite different with Fauré’s music, where nothing is ever really resolved. It’s a music of paradoxes, in which Fauré maintains a form of equivocation. It requires a long gestation period, imposing a special temporality into which the performer must enter in order to determine his or her vision of it. This is elusive music, and you’re confronted with that difficulty when you record it. How would you define these paradoxes? It’s hard to find the words to convey what Fauré’s music expresses. For Vladimir Jankélévitch, it is music that addresses the ear, not calligraphy projected into space. I experience it through sensation. Its intersecting lines, its immense phrases offer a plurality of paths. When you play it, or listen to it, you perceive these potential paths. The composer seems to be proposing a choice, but in reality he has already defined a direction, and he’s leading you along an unpredictable route. That’s what makes his music so addictive! This paradox, which blends harmony and melody very closely, underpins his discourse. This is music where you are the hero!
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