The Elastic Heart of Youth Bruce Levingston

• Jean Sibelius (1865 - 1957): 5 Pieces for Piano, Op. 75:
• 1 Sibelius: 5 Pieces for Piano, Op. 75: No. 5, The Spruce 03:53
• Leoš Janáček (1854 - 1928): 1.X.1905, JW VIII/19:
• 2 Janáček: 1.X.1905, JW VIII/19: I. Presentiment 06:22
• 3 Janáček: 1.X.1905, JW VIII/19: II. Death 08:06
• Augusta Gross: Solace:
• 4 Gross: Solace 03:08
• Claude Debussy (1862 - 1918): Études, L. 136, Book II:
• 5 Debussy: Études, L. 136, Book II: No. 11, Pour les arpèges composés 05:19
• Préludes, Book I, L. 117:
• 6 Debussy: Préludes, Book I, L. 117: No. 8, La fille aux cheveux de lin 02:27
• Suite bergamasque, L. 75:
• 7 Debussy: Suite bergamasque, L. 75: III. Clair de lune 05:44
• Wolfgang Amadeus Mozart (1756 - 1791): Fantasia in D Minor, K. 397:
• 8 Mozart: Fantasia in D Minor, K. 397 05:53
• Domenico Scarlatti (1685 - 1757): Keyboard Sonata in D Minor, Kk. 213:
• 9 Scarlatti: Keyboard Sonata in D Minor, Kk. 213 08:20
• Keyboard Sonata in A Minor, Kk. 54:
• 10 Scarlatti: Keyboard Sonata in A Minor, Kk. 54 05:50
• Missy Mazzoli (b. 1980): The Elastic Heart of Youth:
• 11 Mazzoli: The Elastic Heart of Youth 04:28
• Total Runtime 59:30

Info for The Elastic Heart of Youth

Originating in distinct musical dialects — Baroque, Classical, Nordic, Slavic, French, and contemporary — the works recorded here are bound together by a vivid, elastic heart: a profound spirit of vitality that endures through tension and release, stillness and motion, loss and restoration. Beneath their differing voices beats a kindred pulse shared with the natural world.

Sibelius’s Le Sapin evokes the spruce’s calm and poise, its hushed sonorities suggesting their own logic of repose. Janáček’s Sonata 1.X.1905 bears witness — urgent, searching, unafraid—its broken arcs invoking the dissonances of modernity’s estrangement from nature and the fragile openings through which rebirth begins. Debussy’s Étude pour les arpèges composés and La fille aux cheveux de lin shimmer with shifting light and color, while Clair de lune unfolds in the moon’s tender chiaroscuro, a meditation of light, shadow, and serenity. Mozart’s Fantasy in D minor restores grace and clarity not by denying shadow, but by transfiguring it; its improvisatory nature finds form through discovery. Scarlatti’s sonatas dance with quick, inventive pulse: sunlight on stone, castanets crossing through the air. Their brilliance is youthful joy tempered by seasoned experience.

Gross’s Solace turns inward towards repose. Here the heart practices a different virtuosity — the courage to be calm, to let resonance and renewal begin. Even in this quietude, her music recalls nature’s adaptability, its patient recalibrations in the face of change. Missy Mazzoli’s The Elastic Heart of Youth gathers all these energies into a radiant celebration of life. Its tensile rhythms and glowing harmonies echo the supple strength of the living world—the capacity to bend, to adapt, to begin again.

If we understood the world, we would realize that there is a logic of harmony underlying its manifold apparent dissonances. — Jean Sibelius, In 1907, in conversation with Gustav Mahler.

Bruce Levingston, piano

Bruce Levingston
is one of today's leading figures in contemporary music. Many of the world's most important composers have written works for him and his Carnegie Hall and Lincoln Center world premiere performances of their works have won notable critical acclaim. The New York Times has called him 'one of today's most adventurous musicians' and praises his performances as 'graceful', 'dreamy, and 'hauntingly serene.' The New Yorker has described him as 'elegant and engaging... a poetic pianist who has a gift for glamorous programming,' while The Washington Post has lauded his 'wonderfully even touch' and 'timeless reverie, which Levingston projected beautifully.'

Mr. Levingston has appeared as a soloist and chamber musician in many international music festivals and his recordings have received high critical acclaim. His CD Still Sound was named 'Record of the Month' by MusicWeb International which praised his 'extraordinary gifts as a colorist and a performer who can hold attention rapt with the softest of playing.' In a glowing review of his recent CD Nightbreak, The American Record Guide wrote 'Levingston is a pianist's pianist' and praised his 'stunning and highly illuminating performances', Gramophone called his playing 'masterly'. Levingston's CD Heart Shadow, also received notable praise and was named 'Album of the Week' by New York City's WQXR. The Cleveland Plain Dealer called Levingston's recording 'vivid and richly expressive...a gripping, dynamic performance' and Classics Today lauded his CD Portraits for its 'transcendent virtuosity and huge arsenal of tone color.'

Noted for his innovative and thoughtful programming, Mr. Levingston has performed and collaborated with some of the most interesting artists of our time including painter Chuck Close, actor/author Ethan Hawke, authors Michael Cunningham, Nick McDonell, and George Plimpton, composer/performers Lisa Bielawa and Philip Glass, violinist Colin Jacobsen, and choreographers Jorma Elo and Peter Quanz. His repertoire spans from the Baroque works of Bach and Scarlatti to the Classical and Romantic masterpieces of Mozart, Beethoven, Schubert, and Brahms to the most avant-garde works of today. His programs often feature and highlight many of the twentieth century's most influential composers including Satie, Debussy, Bartok, Webern, and Messiaen. In 2007, Mr. Levingston played a critically acclaimed sold-out concert devoted to the music of Erik Satie at New York's French Institute/Alliance Française.

Long interested in human rights, Mr. Levingston gave performances to assist emerging 'refusniks' from the Soviet Union, served as a U.S. delegate to the American Council on Germany in Berlin and Hamburg, and performed at the United Nations in honor of the people of Denmark for their heroism during World War II. He is founding chair and artistic director of Premiere Commission, Inc., a non-profit foundation that has commissioned and premiered over forty new works.

In 2007, Mr. Levingston appeared as special guest artist at New York's City Center for the world premiere of American Ballet Theatre's production of a new ballet inspired by Chuck Close's life with music by Philip Glass. In 2008, Mr. Levingston performed a critically acclaimed sold-out solo concert at Carnegie Hall premiering works by Grawemeyer Award-winner Sebastian Currier, Germany's celebrated Wolfgang Rihm and Pulitzer Prize-winner Charles Wuorinen. In 2009, Mr. Levingston gave the world premiere of Rome Prize-winner Lisa Bielawa's 'Elegy-Portrait'; in 2010, he performed another all-French program for the Alliance Française in New York and, in 2011, performed premieres by David Bruce, Sebastian Currier and Dmitri Yanov-Yanovsky with the brilliant violinist Colin Jacobsen at Library of Congress in Washington, D.C. and Carnegie Hall in New York City. The New York Times reported that 'Mr. Levingston has found a soul mate in Colin Jacobsen... they joined forces in the kind of recital for which each has become known: driven by ideas and filled with music old, new and well worth hearing.' In 2012, Mr. Levingston celebrated the Tenth Anniversary of Premiere Commission in a special sold-out gala concert with Brooklyn Rider and Lisa Bielawa at the Poisson Rouge. Mr. Levingston records for Orange Mountain Music and Dorian Sono Luminus.

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