CD Review | David Potvin Catharsis (Leaf Music, 2024)

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Leaf Music
4.5
User Ratings (3 Votes)
3.8

Catharsis
David Potvin, piano
Leaf Music, 2024

David Potvin Catharsis

Catharsis can be defined as a release of—and relief from—profound, pent-up emotion. David Potvin’s eponymous album honours this meaning through an emotional and vulnerable performance of four sombre yet powerful works, all by Canadian composers. Each piece was part of Potvin’s program for the 2022 Eckhardt-Grammaté competition. After winning the competition and touring the same program across Canada, these pieces emerged as audience favourites.

The album opens with Cris Derksen’s A Growing Forgiveness. The piece is an artistic response to the tensions of the COVID-19 pandemic. Potvin accurately captures this tension and release, particularly through a flurry of scales and technical passages in the right hand. The timbral contrast between the discordant rhythmic climaxes and the more chordal, quiet motives at the beginning and end are well-emphasized. Jean Coulthard’s 13 Preludes, each contain a subtitle evocative of a specific character or feeling. Potvin especially succeeds in capturing the character of the third prelude, named “Pensive.” Here, the silence speaks just as loudly as the music itself. Potvin allows the breath to intertwine with his playing, bringing a notably human character to the music.

Keiko Devaux’s Murmuration begins with musical gestures akin to bird song in the extreme high register. As the piece progresses the hands move together toward the middle octaves, resolving earlier duality. Potvin’s technical ability expertly navigates the many twists and turns throughout this work, and each gesture truly reads as an individual bird contributing to a greater chorus.

The album concludes with Potvin’s own arrangement of Coulthard’s The Contented House. Originally an orchestral suite, Potvin manages to preserve the tranquil texture and unique colours in his piano transcription. Overall, this album lives up to its name, each work lending different emotional facets that paint a picture of calm, quietude, and release.