New Arts International

Composer–visual artist duality: Čiurlionis stands as one of the only early-20th-century figures whose musical language and pictorial imagination evolved in true simultaneity—his piano works and paintings mirror one another in symbolism, structure, and colour.
A rare repertoire focus: Čiurlionis’ piano music, still scarcely recorded in Western Europe, represents one of the last undiscovered treasure troves of early modernism. The album traces Čiurlionis’ evolution across 35 works, revealing the journey from folkloric intimacy and Chopinesque lyricism to bolder chromaticism, symbolism, and proto-modernist experimentation.
Deep artistic context: Inspired by an interdisciplinary performance with actor and writer Kurt Van Eeghem, the interpretations are informed by Čiurlionis’ visual art, Lithuanian folk traditions, and the emotional world shaped by his mother—an essential figure in his life and art.
Interpretive freedom: Because Čiurlionis left minimal instructions in most scores, the pianist’s role becomes part-creator; this recording embraces that freedom with refinement, tenderness, and structural awareness.
Personal dedication and cultural significance: The album is dedicated to motherhood—echoing Čiurlionis’ own tributes.
Recorded in Dolby Atmos

Mikalojus Konstantinas Čiurlionis (1875–1911) composed as he painted: in symbols, colours, and quiet revelations. His preludes breathe the same air as his visionary canvases, where Lithuanian folklore, mysticism, and nature fuse into a single, luminous world. In the intimate VL-series piano works, gently chromatic lines unfold like folk melodies remembered from childhood—fragments his mother once sang in the wooden house at Druskininkai. A sequence of variation cycles on songs of nature, love, life, and motherhood follows, each crafted with the simplicity of oral tradition yet shaded with an increasingly modern harmonic language.

In these 35 pieces, pianist Geert Callaert enters Čiurlionis’ dual universe of sound and vision with unforced tenderness and structural poise. His interpretations illuminate the inner axis where preludes become landscapes, variations become memories, and chromatic whispers become the painter’s brushstrokes translated into tone. This recording offers not only a rare traversal of a still-undiscovered repertoire, but also an invitation into one of the 20th century’s most singular artistic minds—fragile, searching, and incandescent.

Oh, My Dear Mother