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Piano Classics for Garden Lovers
Romantic piano music chosen to evoke springtime. This relaxing programme of classics by composers such as Mendelssohn and Schumann includes such masterpieces as Spring Song , pastoral-style pieces and charming miniatures which describe spring and its flowers and birds in music. Flowers, plants and clement weather have inspired writers, musicians (and gardeners!) since time immemorial. This album celebrates the rich diversity of one of the best gardening seasons the spring from the sounds of the first cuckoo through to the warmth of early June, all brought together in one perfect, imaginary day. We start at dawn with Mendelssohn s Spring Song with its chirpy, early-morning birdsong beautifully conjured up by the flute. Schumann s Flower Piece evokes the colour and intensity of the first blooms of the season Shakespeare s darling buds of May . And then we are off for a walk in the mid-morning sunshine. In Bird as Prophet , one of his Scenes from the Woods , Schumann brings us the sounds of the birds once more now more serious and eagerly about their business. In the dappled sunlight we come across The Girl with the Flaxen Hair lost in thought and at one with nature. She sings a haunting, nameless song (Mendelssohn) and then runs for cover as a light shower sends rain droplets shimmering across the scene (Chopin s Raindrop Prelude ). The afternoon begins with Mayday revels suggested by Debussy s Arabesque , and then a few lazy hours in the garden Dreaming . We awake to the scent of freshly cut grass and the contented sounds of nature in repose, perfectly captured by Debussy in The Sounds and Perfumes Turn in the Evening Air . The day now moves towards its close with a calm, moonlit night and Beethoven s immortal sonata.