The Firebird / Jeu de Cartes (Complete Ballets)

Editor's Choice - Gramophone Magazine (May 2001)

"Two contrasted Stravinsky ballets played by this enthusiastic Spanish ensemble and given a new feel by their smaller-than-usual presentation." (Gramophone)

"The Firebird and Jeu de cartes provide, within the same genre - the ballet - two diametrically opposed examples of Stravinsky's attitude to the concept of 'inheritance', and more precisely to the history of music itself. Though very different both in their style and in the circumstances of their gestation, these two works may nonetheless be approached through a quality they have in common: the miraculous balance they achieve between the functional element (which is subordinate to the choreography) and the organic element (which enables the music to have a life of its own)." (Nicolas Donin)