Maurice Ravel

La Valse

Out of admiration for the "Waltz King" Johann Strauss, Ravel had already planned a waltz composition in 1906, the realisation of which was hindered by other projects and the outbreak of the First World War. When he received a commission for a ballet in 1919, he took up the idea again and, in his own words, composed "a kind of apotheosis of the Viennese waltz". After initially rather reserved reactions from the public, the "Poème chorégraphique" for orchestra is now one of the top hits of classical music.
The genesis of the work was unusual because Ravel worked simultaneously on two piano versions and the orchestral score. The version for solo piano as well as that for two pianos are therefore not preliminary stages for the final orchestral score, nor are they subsequently created piano reductions, but rather musically independent versions of the work, which Ravel also had published. Even more strongly than in the orchestra, the structure and articulation as well as the clarity of the lines in the composition come to the fore in these delightful piano versions.
This testifies once again to Ravel’s mastery. Reason enough to present these two piano versions for the first time in Urtext editions which were prepared on the basis of all the authentic sources.