The maestro of Minimalist piano music has done it again, with an album of gentle melodies and soothing sounds from Yann Tiersen (b.1970) a composer best known outside his native France for the soundtrack to the movie Amélie (2001): the soundtrack sold over 200,000 copies in his homeland, and became Platinum in the US and Germany.
Tiersen’s music helped to make the movie a hit, capturing its bittersweet mix of humour and sadness, and many of the best-known pieces from the soundtrack are included on this new album, such as the Satie-tinged ‘Waltz of Amélie’, but there is much more recent music here which Tiersen wrote in the wake of the film’s success, including extracts from his soundtracks to Goodbye Lenin (2003) and Tabarly (2008), which tells the tragic story of the French sailor Eric Tabarly, who won the Single-Handed Transatlantic Yacht Race twice before drowning in the Irish Sea.
Tiersen’s music is often melancholy and reflective, but there are many lighter and more uptempo numbers on this wide-ranging survey of his output, which is sure to share the popular success of Jeroen van Veen’s many other albums for Brilliant Classics such as his Minimalist Piano Collections (8551 and 9171) and compendiums of Ludovico Einaudi (94910 and 9452), Simeon ten Holt (9434 and 9453) and Jacob ter Veldhuis (94873). ‘The music needs to speak for itself, and that it does, in this consistently enjoyable collection, I have no reservations in recommending to anyone who enjoys minimalism’ (Fanfare).
French composer Yann Tiersen (born 1970) is one of the most popular and successful film music writers of today. His soulful and melancholic music finds its traces in folk music, French chansons, musette waltzes, street music, but also in the minimalism of Satie, Glass and Nyman.
His international breakthrough came with the music for the French blockbuster “Amélie”. Later followed “Goodbey Lenin” and others.
Dutch pianist, pioneer and champion of Minimalism Jeroen van Veen recorded Tiersen’s most popular melodies, playing the piano in his inimitable way: focussed, serene and hypnotising.
A worthy successor of Van Veen’s successful recordings for Brilliant Classics of piano music by Glass, Pärt, Yiruma and many others.
Tracklist:
Yann Tiersen (b.1970)
Pour Amélie
1 Comptine d`un autre été: l`après midi 00:02:25
2 Comptine d’été No. 2 00:02:42
3 Comptine d’été No. 3 00:02:33
4 Le vieux en veut encore 00:01:40
5 Toujours la 00:01:25
6 Comptine d’été No. 1 00:02:22
7 La piece vide 00:01:55
8 La dispute 00:02:17
9 Sur le fil 00:05:16
10 Les jours heureux 00:02:20
11 La chute 00:06:03
12 L’absente 00:03:20
13 Le retour 00:01:52
14 La valse d’Amélie 00:02:43
15 Le moulin 00:03:40
16 Le matin 00:02:07
17 La plage 00:02:13
18 Les retrouvailles 00:02:21
19 La jetee 00:01:02
20 Tabarly 00:02:47
21 8 mmm 00:02:25
22 Point Zero 00:03:07
Good Bye Lenin
23 Summer 78 00:04:00
24 Coma 00:01:59
25 Childhood (1) 00:01:54
26 From Prison to Hospital 00:01:24
27 Mother 00:01:43
28 Watching Lara 00:01:52
29 Selling Dishes 00:00:51
30 First Rendez-Vous 00:01:33
31 The Decant Session 00:00:53
32 Lara’s Castle 00:02:02
33 The Deutsch Mark is Coming 00:01:15
34 I Saw Daddy Today 00:02:20
35 Birthday Preparations 00:01:46
36 Good Bye Lenin 00:05:30
37 Childhood (2) 00:02:44
38 Letters 00:01:32
39 Mother’s Journey 00:01:33
40 Preparations for the Last TV Fake 00:03:12
41 Mother Will Die 00:03:30
42 Father is Late 00:01:42
43 Father and Mother 00:03:29
44 Finding the Money 00:01:32
45 Summer 78 (2) 00:04:25