Les sons et les parfums is a newly recorded personal anthology of 20th-century French music curated and performed by pianist Janina Fialkowska. This affectionate musical memoir evokes a vibrant portrait of Paris during Fialkowska’s youth, when “Poulenc and Tailleferre were still very much alive, and the souls of Ravel, Debussy, and Fauré were still omnipresent”.

“This recording awakens in me a feeling of pure nostalgia, not only for those long ago studies immersed in the ‘French School’, but also to the evocative power of this music. These composers, who are at once singular but different from each other, magically revive this now-defunct Paris, which I had the good fortune to know in my youth,” writes Janina Fialkowska.

For over 40 years, Janina Fialkowska has enchanted audiences and critics around the world. Praised for her musical integrity, her refreshing natural approach, and her unique piano sound, she is known as “one of the Grandes Dames of piano playing” (Frankfurter Allgemeine).

Fialkowska has received her native Canada’s highest honours, including Officer of the Order of Canada, the Governor General’s 2012 Lifetime Achievement Award in Classical Music, as well as three honorary doctorates. She passes on her considerable musical experience in master classes and at her annual International Piano Academy in Bavaria, where she now resides. Fialkowska is a frequent juror for the world’s most prestigious piano competitions.

Janina Fialkowska began her piano studies in her native Montreal with her mother at the age of 4, and later with Yvonne Hubert. In Paris she studied with Yvonne Lefébure and in New York at the Juilliard School with Sascha Gorodnitzki. Fialkowksa’s career was launched in 1974, when the legendary Arthur Rubinstein became her mentor after her prize-winning performance at his inaugural Master Piano Competition. Rubinstein recognized her as a “born Chopin interpreter”, which laid the foundation for her lifelong identification with this composer.