Hyperion Records

Gabriel Pierné was one of the many French composers who flourished in the latter part of the nineteenth century and the early part of the twentieth but his name today appears rarely in concert programmes outside his native country, despite the attractiveness of much of his music. A pupil of Franck and Massenet, he was something of a child prodigy. He wrote a few operas and ballets of some distinction, as well as an appreciable amount of orchestral and chamber music. Whilst not specifically a ‘harp’ composer, he wrote two orchestral pieces for it—a Concertstück and a Fantaisie basque—and included the instrument in several chamber works. The solo Impromptu-Caprice, an early piece, was also published for piano.

from notes by Susan Drake © 1989