Thibaudet is a versatile pianist with over 30 recordings to his credit. He appears with leading orchestra and conductors around the world but also is into the crossover area, having done an entire album of the music of Duke Ellington. This compilation goes back to his recordings from 1994 to the present, and selects a dozen tracks tied in various ways into well-known movie scores. Though the jewel box says nothing about it, four of the tracks are not piano solos but concerto-type versions with either the Cleveland Orchestra of the BBC Symphony. Rachmaninoff and Satie each get two entries in the program. The notes include a paragraph on each of the films represented, and the CD’s printed side looks like a reel of film. This is a different sort of approach to putting together an album of film themes, and with the sensitive playing of Thibaudet makes for an enjoyable hour plus.
Tracklist: Spartacus Love Theme, The Piano, Pride & Prejudice, The Pianist (CHOPIN: Ballade No. 1), The Royal Tenenbaums (SATIE: Gymnopedie No. 1), Somewhere in Time (RACHMANINOFF: Rhapsody on a Theme of Paganini – excerpt), Chocolat (SATIE: Gnossienne No. 1), The Right Stuff (DEBUSSY: Clair de lune), Brief Encounter (RACHMANINOFF: Piano Concerto No. 2, Adagio), A League of Their Own (ELLINGTON: In a Sentimental Mood), Dangerous Moonlight (ADDINSELL: Warsaw Concerto), Fantasia 2000 (GERSHWIN: Rhapsody in Blue).
– John Sunier
