Asmik Grigorian - Dissonance - Opera News

The intimacy of art song—even the lush, late-Romantic art songs of Rachmaninoff—reveals the essence of an artist and can expose weaknesses, or, in Grigorian’s case, accentuate strengths. She’s an intense, focused musician who takes what could otherwise be seen as a routine list of Rachmaninoff’s greatest vocal hits and transforms them. Together with pianist Lukas Geniušas, Grigorian treats each song like a miniature drama, from the brief “He Took All from Me” to the six-and-a-half-minute “Dissonance,” which lends the album its title. “Dissonance,” also the first track on the album, is one of its many highlights. The longest track here, it gives Grigorian time to build an entire world of sound, atmosphere and feeling,

A worthy artistic partner for Grigorian, Geniušas matches her specificity and focus. His playing is virtuoso and expansive in “Spring Waters” and “Fragment from Musset” yet nuanced and subtle in “In the Silence of the Night” and “Let Us Rest.”