Novo Piano 11

Rough Trade Album of the Month: January 2018 (No. 3)

Maxence Cyrin is a French pianist and composer based in Paris. After graduating from a Conservatoire de Musique he got enthralled by electronic music. His first compositions and recordings date back to the 1990s. He soon developed a predilection for the dialogue between pop and classical music, as apparent from his album Modern Rhapsodies (released in 2005 under the F Communications label founded by Laurent Garnier) with his reinterpretations of famous electronic tunes by Depeche Mode, Massive Attack and Aphex Twin. In Novö Piano, an album released in 2009, Maxence Cyrin continued to outline his universe, adapting famous songs by Nirvana, Daft Punk, or the Pixies for the piano. Following The Fantasist, an album consisting of pieces for piano, strings and synthesizers, his Nocturnes album, released in 2015, pays homage to the piano in ten elegant subtle compositions. Novö Piano II confirms his skill to transfigure pop music’s universality through the erudite sensibility of classical music, revealing a new and enchanting dimension of the work of artists such as Bjork, The Cure and Dominique A. Guest appearances by Miss Kittin and Frantic.