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Daniil Trifonov's latest album: 'My American Story: North' bristles with virtuosity / FINANCIAL TIMES

Posted: October 9, 2024

For his latest Deutsche Grammophon project, Daniil Trifonov is embarking on a pianistic journey across the Americas. The first of two volumes, My American Story – North, takes in a wide range of repertoire from the United States, the country the pianist has called home for almost half his life. The album ranges from jazz and swing to modernism, minimalism and popular soundtracks, covering a century of US music for solo piano or piano and orchestra. “I did not intend to record an anthology,” says Trifonov. “These are simply favourites of mine that speak to me on a musical level.” Joined by The Philadelphia Orchestra and its Music and Artistic Director, Yannick Nézet-Séguin, in George Gershwin’s much-loved Concerto in F and the world premiere of the brand-new concerto written for him by Mason Bates, Trifonov also performs solo works by John Adams, John Cage, Aaron Copland, John Corigliano, Dave Grusin, Thomas Newman, Art Tatum and Bill Evans.

My American Story – North available digitally, on 2 CDs and as an 3-LP vinyl version (offering extended liner notes, additional photos and two bonus tracks). One of these, Trifonov’s transcription of “Secunda” from the soundtrack to the popular video game The Elder Scrolls V: Skyrim was released as a digital single on 19 July. His transcription of Victor Young’s When I Fall in Love (as interpreted by Bill Evans), which will be accompanied by a video; by John Adams’s China Gates; and the main theme from Thomas Newman’s American Beauty. A video for the finale of Gershwin’s Concerto in F comes out on the same day as the album.

Daniil Trifonov moved to the US aged 17 to study with Sergei Babayan at the Cleveland Institute of Music (CIM). As well as helping him prepare for the 2010 Chopin Competition and 2011 Tchaikovsky Competition, his teacher also introduced him to films, literature and other musical genres, including the jazz piano of Art Tatum. Still friends today, Trifonov and Babayan released the critically acclaimed Rachmaninoff For Two earlier this year (“a winning mix of limitless pianism, deep knowledge and visionary boldness” – Gramophone).
 

FROM FINANCIAL TIMES - Daniil Trifonov showcases a wide range of piano music from the US. The pianist covers concertos, jazz and swing, film soundtracks, modernism and minimalism

Richard Fairman writes….The journey that Daniil Trifonov has made in his life is also reflected in his music. Born in Russia, he started out as a star performer of the great Russian piano concertos. Now resident in the US, he has taken up American piano music in all its open-minded variety.

His latest album, My American Story: North, ranges across concertos, jazz and swing, film soundtracks, modernism and minimalism. With a nod towards his young, Russo-Latino family, he is also promising a second volume, My American Story: South, which will showcase Latin American music.

A pair of concertos, both with Yannick Nézet-Séguin conducting the Philadelphia Orchestra, form the backbone of this first release. Gershwin’s Concerto in F, most popular of all American piano concertos, gets an electric performance, less bluesy than some, but bristling with virtuosity.


Trifonov gave the premiere of Mason Bates’s Piano Concerto in 2022 and a live recording of that performance is included here. Although the concerto goes through some thin and disjointed passages, it is packed with vivid and individual ideas freed from any stylistic expectations. It is American music through and through.

The solo works include Aaron Copland’s terse Piano Variations, John Adams’s delicately minimalist China Gates and John Corigliano’s intriguing Fantasia on an Ostinato. Throw in film-score themes, several short jazz numbers, some dazzling finger-work in an Art Tatum arrangement, and John Cage’s iconic 4’33”, and the range of how much has been fitted in here is a marvel.


PHOTO: © Dario Acosta

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