CD: Après Fauré

On "After Fauré", Mehldau plays four preludes from a period of thirty-seven years in Gabriel Fauré's oeuvre as well as an abridged excerpt from the Adagio of his Piano Quartet in G minor. Here, four of Mehldau's compositions inspired by Fauré are presented as a group, supplemented by two sections of works by the French composer.

Of the album Après Fauré, Mehldau writes: "If the sublime gives us a foretaste of our mortality, then this music could convey the severity of death - the death of Fauré as he approached it, but also the foreboding of our own. Finally, we feel a kinship with the composer in the question he threw into the future, to us. I have composed four pieces to accompany Fauré's music here and to share with you, the listeners, the way in which I have engaged with Fauré's question."

"This format is similar to my project After Bach," he continues. “The connections are less obvious, but Fauré's harmonic imprint is present in all four works. There is also a structural influence in terms of how he performed his musical material pianistically - he masterfully used the sonority of the instrument as a means of expression. For example, in my first 'Prelude' the melody is linked to a continuous arpeggio that is both part of it and hovers over it; in my 'Nocturne' it is possible to hear the echoing chordal approach in the opening of Fauré's No. 12.”