Magical Connection
Love Is A Soft Touch
Ferrante & Teicher
Produced by George Butler
Orchestra Conducted by Nick Perito
Musical Coordinator: Joe Malin
Recorded at National Recording Studios, NYC
Engineer: Frank Kulaga
Art Direction: Frank Gauna
Ferrante & Teicher play Baldwin Pianos
United Artists Records STEREO UAS 6771
From the back cover: Take one part infant prodigy, six years of age and already an accomplished musician; add one part dedication and the desire to master music; one part innate talent, bone-deep and God-given: In a mortar of granite discipline blend them gently and add a pinch of inspiration and a heaping measure of the will to make beauty live, and you have the living recipe for a consummate musical artist. Double the proportions, the ingredients and put the two finished products together, and you have created an even finer confection: The rich and brilliant unity of two phenomenal musicians, two compelling poets in melody.
Ferrante and Teicher, pianists par excellence, are a life-long team, remarkably alike, and as tantalizingly different as identical twins. Both child prodigies, artists as adolescents, they are Juilliard trained, and rigidly disciplined in the long hard study of the classical tradition, and it is perhaps the rigor of this unforgiving technical apprentice- ship which has been the hallmark of the two friends' individual and collective careers. Because we are dealing with artists here, with men whose overmastering concern with their product exerts a powerful influence on the undeviating quality of their music. These are no weekend tunesmiths, stretching a little talent and a lot of noise over a sudden hollow popularity. These are men whose firm musical foundation in the traditions of classical music has formed the basis for one of the freshest and most original approaches to contemporary popular music in recent years. Let's take a look at what they do.
'Bridge Over Troubled Waters', a Paul Simon opus is about as close to everyone's definition of the new ballad style in American music as it's possible to get. A strange vehicle for two classical pianists? Listen to their rendition in its depth and power of sentiment and emotion. Or take the treatment of the Lennon-McCartney classic, 'Let It Be'. An adapted rock-spiritual soul song. Not for the formal, schooled musician, you say. Listen to it, to the nuance of phrase, the innuendo of touch, the dimension of style they bring to it, their instrumental insight. Or take the ballad, 'Snowbird'. Where have you heard so much done with the song, and all this without voice, without lyric, in other words, without half of what the music world depends upon to put over even its best material. Then turn to theatre and a musical comedy piece, such as 'I'll Never Fall In Love Again'. Another genre, another type of music altogether, and yet handled with the same kind of tenderness, the same brilliant responsibility as the ballads. Go to the themes from motion pictures such as 'Pieces Of Dreams', or 'Jean', and the same rules hold good. And the point of it all, and the reason for this message to you is to alert you to what is happening here. Ferrante and Teicher bring the solid foundations in technique and performance to the music of today, and, with verve and versatility unmatched in any comparable team, give it a power and vitality that only inspiration can supply. A rare combination. And a rare blend of technique and temporality: Ferrante and Teicher: Love Is A Soft Touch.
Magical Connection
Love Is A Soft Touch
Let It Be
Jean (Main Theme)
Smile A Little Smile For Me
Pieces Of Dreams
Snowbird
Is That All There Is
I'll Never Fall In Love Again (from the musical production "Promises, Promises)
Bridge Over Trouble Water
Oh To Be Young Again
Paper Mache
