AZERBAIJANI PIANO CONCERTOS

Fikret AMIROV / Elmira NAZIROVA Piano Concerto after Arabian Themes

Vasif ADIGEZALOV Piano Concerto No 4

Tofig GULIYEV Gaytagi – Dance

Farhad BADALBEYLI The Sea, Shusha

Farhad Badalbeyli, piano

Murad Adigezalzade, piano

Joan Rogers, soprano

Royal Philharmonic / Dmitry Yablonsky

All of the composers here combine elements of ancient Azerbaijani tradition with Western forms, colourful orchestration and vivid musical storytelling. This is epitomized in Vasif Adigezalov’s symphonically proportioned Fourth Piano Concerto, while Fikret Amirov adds a touch of Arabian exoticism into his Concerto. The bubbling energy of Tofig Guliyev’s ‘Gaytagi’ dance adds a splash of jazz, and Farhad Badalbeyli’s works depict The Sea in an expansive and atmospheric score, followed by the sad tale of the city of Shusha expressed in a vocalise.

The music of Fikret Amirov has already featured in a successful Naxos release (8572170), but this release also develops composers otherwise unrepresented in the mainstream catalogues, Tofig Guliyev and Farhad Badalbeyli. These marvellous scores are a real breath of fresh air and will open doors to an entirely new musical world for many people, especially when given the finest recordings with an award winning soloist and world class orchestra, the Royal Philharmonic.

The pianist and conductor Farhad Badalbeyli was born in 1947 and since 1991 has been rector of Baku Music Academy. The winner of a number of international competitions, he has received various honours in the Soviet Union and in his native Azerbaijan.

Naxos 8572666