Lucien Wurmser wrote almost exclusively for his instrument. 
The aim of this project is to publish the essential of his production for piano. Forty pieces are available, split in two discs, in this edition for the independent label Editions Hortus. The first (release date 27/12/2024) is also available as a compact disc. The most of these pieces are here presented to the public for the very first time and represent the biggest amount of Wurmser music recorded so far. Here is the complete list of the pieces for the two recordings which comprises, among other pieces, the complete sets of his Études de concert et de concours, his Gradus Moderne (6 études), the two préludes sets and the whole five Concertini.
Études de concert et de concours (1947)
1. Légèrété
2. Intermède en forme de Habanera
3. Doubles notes
4. Voltige
5. Romance
6. Bravoure
Ballata (1939)
Concertini
1. Concertino appassionato (1939)
2. Concertino giocoso (1943)
3. Concertino accelerato (1955)
4. Concertino delicato (1952)
5. Concertino patetico (1937)
Crépuscule (1966)
Toccata (1955)
Le gradus moderne (1960)
1. Mouvement
2. Main gauche seule
3. Papillons blancs
4. Petite Toccata
5. L’Enjouée
6. Arabesque
Trois préludes (1913)
1. Soir!
2. Silhouette!
3. Brise
Préludes (1954)
1. La mer
2. La campagne
3. La nuit
4. Rêves
5. Fantasque
6. Fluidité
7. Danse grise
8. Vagues
9. Ma jazotte
10. L’entêté
11. Sérénité
12. Ballerine
Trois pièces (1966)
1. Élégie
2. Interlude
3. Air de ballet
Valse pittoresque (1902)
Solitude (1923)
Critical considerations
To explain why Wurmser’s work has been unjustly forgotten despite its quality, some critical factors must be considered. Lacking major publishers, Wurmser did not benefit from widespread dissemination of his music. The small- and medium-sized publishing houses of his time saw their catalogues disappear, and it is no coincidence that the only major collections still in circulation (Le Gradus Moderne and the Preludes) were published late in his career by more international publishers, Durand and Eschig.
Another factor is purely chronological. Wurmser began publishing early (with Gavotte in 1896) and continued until the end of his life (Trois Pièces in 1966). However, his compositional output was not evenly spread over seven decades but developed in waves, peaking after 1947 with the first book of études. Starting from salon pieces and descriptive works, the composer was able to develop a personal language connected to the avant-garde movements of his time. Unfortunately, these avant-gardes had already become historical by the time Wurmser reached the height of his art: the aesthetics of the second half of the 20th century would have erased any trace of post-Debussian or post-Ravelian impressionism. Wurmser, however, still enjoyed, during the 1950s and 1960s, in the era of integral Serialism, putting on paper all his craftsmanship, a testimony to what French music had been at the beginning of the 20th century.
Wurmser’s path was unique: at seventy, and for the next twenty years, he accelerated the pace of his production, though looking backward. We believe this was neither due to nostalgia nor backwardness. Fully a product of the Third Republic and its artistic epic, but dying under the Fifth, Lucien Wurmser is one of the last fruits of the French school and of what its “golden age” was able to offer us.