Rachmaninoff— Sergei Babayan, piano (Deutsche Grammophon)
"It would be impossible to begin to describe what kind of healing power it has. It is a spring garden of new hopes and rebirth, new inspirations and new beginnings for those who have lost their way and their faith. One thing which cannot be closer to the truth is what he says about music being Love, being born in the heart and appealing only to the heart.” That's CIM faculty member Sergei Babayan on the music of Rachmaninoff. His debut solo album on Deutsche Grammophon reflects his deep regard for a composer whose music helped make him a pianist. Babayan came across Rachmaninoff at a difficult stage in his life. He was thirteen years old, tussling with the piano and finding little pleasure any more in practicing. Then his father gave him a recording of Rachmaninoff’s Second Piano Concerto. It was love at first note. “It was unimaginable. From the moment I heard the opening of the Second Concerto I was completely spellbound. I stopped going out, stopped meeting my friends or answering the phone... I was completely obsessed with everything: the melodies, harmonies, the complex chromatic shifts in the counterpoints and the ineffable beauty of the inner voices; all I did was listen to this music, and soon I tried to play it myself. I was glued to the piano...and my profound love for Rachmaninoff has lasted ever since.” For this album, Babayan has chosen a number of Rachmaninoff's miniatures that have been companions and an inspiration to him over the years. They include selected Preludes, Études-Tableaux and Moments musicaux plus some transcriptions: the third movement of the Cello Sonata and two songs 'Lilacs' and 'Melody' that the pianist has known and loved since he was a child. [Note: Link sends you to the Deutsche Grammophon website.]