Piano Concerto in E-flat major

Massenet is remembered almost entirely as an opera composer, which makes it easy to miss that he wrote this substantial and fluent piano concerto late in his career. The opening movement begins at a moderate pace, with the orchestra stating the main theme before the piano enters with expansive, singing lines that carry the characteristic warmth of his operatic writing. The work received a famously cool reception at its 1903 premiere, reportedly because the dedicatee, the sixty-year-old pianist Louis Diemer, was no longer in his best form, and the concerto quietly disappeared for decades before a handful of recordings brought it back to attention.

What to listen for

In the slow middle movement, the piano takes a long, arching melodic line over a gently cushioned orchestral texture, with the harmony moving through unexpected chromatic turns before settling back. Notice how the first movement builds its momentum through the interplay between the piano's lyrical outpouring and the orchestra's rhythmic punctuation, with the piano gradually taking on faster figurations as the movement progresses.

Recommended rendition

The recording by Stephen Coombs with the BBC Scottish Symphony Orchestra conducted by Jean-Yves Ossonce on Hyperion (CDA66897) has been frequently cited as a benchmark account of this neglected work.

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