Bertrand Chamayou performs Ravel's two piano concertos — Conducted by Esa-Pekka Salonen

Following up on his extraordinary live recording of the complete Ravel works for solo piano on the composer's 150th birthday, French piano virtuoso Bertrand Chamayou returns to the Philharmonie de Paris to perform both of Ravel's piano concertos alongside the Orchestre de Paris and their next principal conductor, the illustrious Esa-Pekka Salonen! Each of Ravel's concertos is unique in its genre — the Concerto in G a blend of jazzy rhythms and infectious percussion around a heart-stoppingly lovely Adagio; the Concerto for the Left Hand an astonishingly inventive example of artistic plenitude amid technical constraints — and Chamayou, "one of today's leading Ravel interpreters" (Bachtrack), performs both with enthusiastic brio and exquisite finesse. Salonen also leads the Orchestre de Paris in Tumblebird Contrails by American composer Gabriella Smith, inspired by Jack Kerouac and an ecstatic moment observing the Pacific; and the Suite from Bartók's Miraculous Mandarin, a selection of the highly evocative music composed for his controversial pantomime ballet that faced censure on moral grounds in the 1920s before finding renewed appreciation decades later.

Photos: Esa-Pekka Salonen © Patrick Swirc / Bertrand Chamayou © Marco Borggreve