Rubicon Classics is proud to present a double CD album featuring the music of Charles-Valentin Alkan recorded by Andrew Yiangou. On 29 April 1844 in Paris’s Salle Erard, Alkan returned to the platform after an absence of six years. Bach, Scarlatti, Beethoven and Weber featured, as well as four of Alkan’s latest compositions. Two of these appear on Andrew Yiangou’s remarkable recital – the Nocturne, op.22, and the Saltarelle in E minor, op.23. The centrepiece in the programme is the misleadingly titled Sonatina in A minor, op.61. This is a large-scale sonata of huge technical challenges.

Busoni claimed that Alkan was, along with Chopin, Liszt, Schumann and Brahms, one of the five greatest composers for the piano since Beethoven. Alkan certainly discovered unheard sonorities imbued with a disturbing power, and a preoccupation with the darker shades of human experience.

Andrew Yiangou’s programme is a fascinating view into the musical world of one of the most enigmatic composers of the 19th century.