About this Recording

A child prodigy, Stephan Elmas met Franz Liszt and made his acclaimed Viennese performing debut in 1885. Like Chopin, Elmas combined the character of folk⁠-⁠music dance forms to create sophisticated and deeply personal statements, and his Mazurkas are musical poems and paintings in which depictions of everyday scenes are combined with soulful lyricism. This world première recording by Armenian music specialist Mikael Ayrapetyan provides ample evidence of the great contribution Elmas’s Mazurkas make to the piano repertoire and to the musical heritage of Armenia and beyond.