Mirage: Mirna Lekić, piano Mirna Lekić

• Franghiz Ali-Zadeh (b. 1947): Music for Piano:
• 1 Ali-Zadeh: Music for Piano 07:48
• Isaac Albeniz (1860 - 1909): Leyenda (Asturias):
• 2 Albeniz: Leyenda (Asturias) 06:27
• Alan Hovhaness (1911 - 200): Achtamar:
• 3 Hovhaness: Achtamar: I. Adagio 01:36
• 4 Hovhaness: Achtamar: II. Allegro 01:36
• Igor Shamo (1925 - 1982): Prelude in F-sharp Minor:
• 5 Shamo: Prelude in F-sharp Minor 04:44
• Natalie Draper (b. 1985): Fractured Bells:
• 6 Draper: Fractured Bells 06:36
• Helmut Lachenmann (b. 1935): Guero:
• 7 Lachenmann: Guero 04:54
• Claude Debussy (1862 - 1918): Pagodes:
• 8 Debussy: Pagodes 05:27
• Leopold Godowsky (1870 - 1938): Gamelan:
• 9 Godowsky: Gamelan 03:47
• Henry Cowell (1897 - 1965): Aeolian Harp:
• 10 Cowell: Aeolian Harp 02:09
• Sergei Prokofiev (1891 - 1953): Prelude op. 12 no. 7:
• 11 Prokofiev: Prelude op. 12 no. 7 02:34
• Martin Scherzinger (b. 1975): The Horse is not Mine, a Hobby Horse:
• 12 Scherzinger: The Horse is not Mine, a Hobby Horse 02:18
• Total Runtime 49:56

Info for Mirage: Mirna Lekić, piano

MIRAGE is a collection of sonic illusions, allusions, and transformations that celebrate the piano’s unique capability to imitate, echo and morph into other instruments. These compositions reveal and free a broad spectrum of sounds inherent in the instrument, inviting it to take on the roles of a traveler and a polyglot. The collection provides both a path to deepening our relationship with the piano and an opportunity to examine its place within a wider musical sphere. The album title points to the illusive and elusive aspects of the various transformative processes and their results, as well as to the ongoing conversation between tradition and innovation in the never-ending search for the many possibilities the instrument has to offer.

"The inclusion of works by 11 very different composers in a recording by Mirna Lekić on the Furious Artisans label turns the disc into something akin to modern art in painting. The CD’s overall title, “Mirage,” hints at what Lekić is looking for here: ways in which the piano takes on the sonic appearance of other instruments, using its unique percussive capabilities to produce aural scenes that sound as if they are being musically painted by sound producers of many types. As with the Chochieva release, this one requires listeners to be fully attuned (so to speak) with the pianist’s ideas in order to appreciate the individual works as parts of a larger whole. Also as with the Chochieva recording, the pieces here do not really relate all that well to each other sans the connective tissue supplied by the pianist’s intent in performing them. Strictly on a musical basis, the works here are often jarring in juxtaposition – which is not much of a surprise, given that they were composed as long ago as 1892 and as recently as 2013. The composers are also a highly varied group, some being quite well-known and others being thoroughly unfamiliar. The selections are presented in scattershot fashion that presumably reflects Lekić’s notions of the colors and shapes of the individual works. First is Music for Piano (1989/1997) by Franghiz Ali-Zadeh (born 1947), featuring string harmonics with a vaguely Middle Eastern sound beneath shimmering ornamentation. Next is Albéniz’ Leyenda (Asturias) from 1892, filled with staccato emphasis. Then come the two very short pieces of Achtamar (1948) by Alan Hovhaness, the intentional exoticism of the first contrasting with the rhythmically varied second. Next is Prelude in F-sharp Minor (1962) by Igor Shamo (1925-1982), its Rachmaninoff-like elements given some updated harmonic twists."

Mirna Lekić, piano

Mirna Lekić
Born and raised in Sarajevo, Bosnia and Herzegovina, Mirna Lekić is a pianist and educator living in New York City. She plays a wide range of repertoire that reflects her interests in intercultural music, historical performance practice, and contemporary works. As a recitalist and chamber musician she has performed in the United States, Canada and Europe, at venues including Carnegie-Weill Hall, Symphony Space, Chicago Cultural Center, St. Martin-in-the-Fields in London, Théâtre de l’Ile Saint-Louis in Paris, and the Hall of the St. Petersburg Union of Composers and the Gorki Leninskiye Museum in Russia. Her performances are featured on Centaur and Romeo Records and have been broadcast on WQXR, WNYC, WFMT, WPRB and Bosnian TV and radio stations.

Mirna is a graduate of the Eastman School of Music, the Mannes School of Music, and the Graduate Center of the City University of New York, where she earned a doctorate with a dissertation focusing on the music of Claude Debussy. She currently serves as an Associate Professor of Music at Queensborough Community College - City University of New York, and as Associate Faculty in Piano at Columbia University.

Booklet for Mirage: Mirna Lekić, piano