A Singer’s Notes by Keith Kibler 36: Childe Maurice

Posted by  • August 15, 2011 • Printer-friendly

Maurice Ravel in 1930

He comes out like Oberon, with hair of gold and a light step. It's a very careful walk he has, nothing fancy, and he sits on the bench with a kind of directness and naturalness of purpose. The first notes are the "Menuet Antique." I am sitting far away at this point, and I hear the jagged off-beats of the left hand hopping out. It takes no time to be lost in this world, a world of fantastic play and even more fantastic loneliness. Is it Jean-Yves Thibaudet, or is it Ravel? Always, when watching this pianist, I see a solitary soul. Nothing in his biography suggests this kind of singleness, far from it. So maybe it really is Ravel, dreaming in his little house, full of clocks.  When Jean-Yves got to the "Pavane," the sense of hearing an intimacy was complete. He played it at a good clip;  but its tale is far from simple, like a Matisse. Ravel's music is not child-like. It is the music of a child.

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