Enescu Piano Music Luiza Borac, piano

The Three Piano Suites
No. 1 in G minor Dans le style ancien Op. 3 (1897)
No. 2 in D major Op. 10 (1901)
No. 3 Pièces Impromptues Op. 18 (1913-16)

AVIE AV 0013

Prelude and Fugue in C Major (1903)
Nocturne in D Flat Major (1907)
Scherzo (1896)
Pièce sur le nom de Fauré (1922)
Piano Sonata No.1 in F sharp minor Op. 24/1 (1924)
Piano Sonata No.3 in D major Op. 24/3 (1934)

AVIE AV2081 2 SACD set

These are welcome additions to the Enescu discography given by a pianist who has steeped herself in her compatriot's music. If you have been bewitched by the great opera Oedipe (reviewed by Musical Pointers on Naxos and EMI - the latter definitely to be preferred in my opinion) you will want to explore George Enescu's diverse music further.

Of the Suites, the third collection (not composed as an integrated work) is the most characteristic of his later style; I think the second release is the one to go for.

Playing sounds fine (I don't have any scores) and the notes by Martin Anderson are a plus.

There are very full and enthusiastic reviews from MusicWeb linked from the Avie catalogue, and I suggest you check them out there.

Rob Barnett evokes the haunting Carillon Nocturne, which "with its grotesqueries, Chinoiserie and atonality leans in and out of Schoenberg's Hanging Gardens and Cyril Scott's Lotusland. This movement shows Mlle Borac at her most impressive with her powers of concentration unwavering. It rounds out the disc in an enigmatic mist: elusive and sphinx-like". I can't do better!