Folk Themes
Navona, 2023
8/10
The Armenian musician Kariné Poghosyan delivers very emotive piano playing derived from folk motifs on this worldly listen that highlights 4 composers who bring 5 different cultures along for the experience.
“Three-Fours (Valse Suite), op.71” starts the listen with Poghosyan’s agile and very precise playing emitting both mature and adventurous progressions in the Samuel Coleridge-Taylor (half British, half Sierra-Leonese) piece, and “Lyric Pieces” follows with both dreamy and firm moments of timeless, warm beauty that illuminates Norway’s Edvard Grieg’s original.
The back half of the listen includes the intimate and stirring “Six Dances for Piano”, where Poghosyan’s strong attention to mood makes this Komitas Vardapet (Armenian) composition the album’s best, and Hungary’s Franz Liszt’s “4 Rhapsodies” exits the listen with both rumbling and pretty moments that alternate between tense and serene in Poghosyan’s very capable hands.
A body of work that’s passionate and exploratory, Folk Themes illustrates much tenderness and vibrancy via Poghosyan’s riveting playing.
Travels well with: Jeffrey Hall- Artifacts; Frank Felice- The Beauty Of Innuendos