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FLORIAN NOACK 19
How did you get the idea of this journey in music?
Many different factors lie at the origins of this project: one of them is the fascination
and wonder I used to feel as a child when I heardmusic evoking distant lands (such
Russian songs, which speak to the imagination!). Another is the curiosity aroused
when I read Guy Sacre’s book
La Musique de piano
,
1
inwhich the author wrote of rare
repertory with such great conviction. For me, opening that book was like setting
out on an adventure to look for works by composers whose very name was quite
often completely unknown to me.
Finally, there was the discovery, over the past few years, of a whole area of the
repertory, those works whose composers have been inspired to write them by
the various folk traditions, the unique character and the richness of each of these
musical languages. I wanted to set them side by side, to explore the link between
popular and art music. I also felt the urge, through the pieces assembled here,
to evoke a time when music wasn’t an art object with a marginal connection to
everyday life, but was an integral part of people’s daily existence, in a way that
was at once simple and necessary. After all, don’t you need music for celebrations,
festivals and dances?
In the course of my research, I often fell in love with works that weren’t originally
composed for piano. When that happened, I didn’t hesitate to present a more or
less free arrangement of them.
1. Guy Sacre,
La Musique de piano
(Paris: Robert Laffont, ‘Bouquins’ series, two volumes, 1998).