Concert pianist Rea Beaumont’s inaugural album A Shrinking Planet features a global outlook with four compositions that each express the universal subject of humankind’s innate desire to search and explore. The album highlights Canada’s multiculturalism with the cultural diversity of its composers and its trilingual album notes, in English, French, and Spanish.

The virtuoso works on A Shrinking Planet showcase Beaumont’s pianistic mastery with dazzling technical demands and a stunning array of tone colours. Three of the pieces are world premieres. Beaumont worked with each composer, including Canadian icon Barbara Pentland (1912-2000), whom she knew while pursuing Graduate studies at the University of British Columbia in Vancouver. Pentland’s *Small Pieces for a Shrinking Planet (1988-90), with its quintessentially global perspective, inspired the album’s title. This five-movement set draws attention to the human rights violations in Argentina’s guerra sucia or ‘Dirty War’ (1976-83). The opening movement “Vigil: Where are Children?” pays homage to The Mothers of May Plaza (Las Madres de Plaza de Mayo) who held vigils in Buenos Aires as they sought answers to help find their missing children who had disappeared.. CBC commissioned Hong Kong born and JUNO Award winning composer Chan Ka Nin (b. 1949) to write *In Search Of… for Rea Beaumont. The piece blends Eastern and Western influences in its complex passagework that uses every musical interval available in its technical wizardry. Composed as the soundtrack for Director Edmond Chan’s psychological thriller, Chinese-Canadian composer Alice Ping Yee Ho’s (b. 1960) intense Garage (2005) conveys the terror of individuals trapped in an underground garage, frantically trying to escape. In his extraordinary virtuoso work Sonata No. 1: Sounds (Dzwiecki) (1967), Polish-Canadian composer-pianist Walter Buczynski (b.1933) searches for ways to expand the piano’s sonic capabilities. Performed without breaks in between the four movements, the cyclic sonata is based on a simple chromatic motif that is introduced at the opening of the piece and transformed throughout the work, including its lush Adagio and a Scherzo and Trio movement that presents the return of scherzo backwards (in retrograde) to produce a mirror image. This intricate composition concludes with a thunderous finale. A Shrinking Planet received its world premiere on Radio Netherlands and its national premiere on CBC Radio that featured interviews with Beaumont and three of the composers (Chan, Ho, Bucznyski). Three of the four compositions are now included in the Royal Conservatory of Music Licentiate Examination Syllabus, their most advanced piano exam. A Shrinking Planet was the ‘Editor’s Choice’ in Toronto’s WholeNote magazine.

1 Alice Ping Yee Ho Garage 8:31

2 Barbara Pentland Small Pieces for a Shrinking Planet: I. Vigil: Where are the Children 4:15

3 Barbara Pentland Small Pieces for a Shrinking Planet: II. Escape 2:07

4 Barbara Pentland Small Pieces for a Shrinking Planet: III. Surf 3:09

5 Barbara Pentland Small Pieces for a Shrinking Planet: IV. Walls 1:17

6 Barbara Pentland Small Pieces for a Shrinking Planet: V. Reflection 2:15 Total 13:03

7 Chan Ka Nin In Search Of… I. Presto 1:54

8 Chan Ka Nin In Search Of… II. Rubato 4:04

9 Chan Ka Nin In Search Of… III. Allegro con brio 4:36

10 Chan Ka Nin In Search Of… IV. Dolcissimo 5:22 Total 15:58

11 Walter Buczynski Sonata No. 1: Dźwięki [Polish: Sounds] 14:52