Barraqúe - Works for Piano

The Guardian 80

Jean-Pierre Collot/(Winter & Winter)
The French composer – a postwar pupil of Messaien’s – wrote only a handful of works. Collot’s new recording shows his Piano Sonata to be one of the great achievements of serialism

When Jean Barraqué died suddenly in 1973, at the age of 45, he left a legacy of just seven acknowledged works. A study of 20th-century music, published in 1961, had made enormous claims for his significance, suggesting he would become the greatest composer of the second half of the 20th century, but neither during his lifetime, nor in the almost half a century since, have those claims been reflected in performances of his music, which are rare.