This Wednesday, October 11, the second classical music album by Judy Hung, a well-known musician in Vaudreuil-Soulanges, will be available worldwide via major digital platforms. 

Entitled Essence Romantique, this second opus is eagerly awaited. Ms. Hung is involved with the Orchestre symphonique des jeunes de Vaudreuil-Soulanges as conductor. 

Following the acclaimed release of Essence Baroque on solo baroque violin and solo harpsichord in 2022, her new album is performed on historic pianos from the Romantic period, including Broadwood (1823), Graf (1826) and Erard (1866).

These pianos are part of the Richard Burnett Collection of historic keyboard instruments, managed by the UK-based Finchcocks Charity. They were chosen for their ability to provide authentic depth of interpretation, restoring the rich sonorities of Romantic-era pianos.

Inspired by the literature, letters and period sound documentation of Romantic composers and performers, Judy Hung has selected works by Beethoven, Schubert, Mendelssohn, Schumann, Chopin, Liszt and Brahms that highlight the expressive romanticism of nineteenth-century music and help to reveal the exceptional sound of each of these historic pianos. 

By playing on different nineteenth-century pianos, the Essence Romantique album offers contemporary audiences, who are mainly familiar with the Romantic repertoire performed on modern pianos, a new and original listening experience. "Playing some of the most famous pieces from the 19th-century piano repertoire on period pianos allowed me to immerse myself in the Romantic era," says Judy Hung. "Listening to the album, the audience will hear the subtle but distinctive differences between a modern and a historic piano. For me, as a musician, it's wonderful to do this project with the pianos that inspired the composers and to understand what inspired them. It was a beautiful musical journey." 

This project is made possible thanks to the financial support of the Ministère des Affaires municipales et de l'Habitation, the Conseil des arts et lettres du Québec and the MRC de Vaudreuil-Soulanges, as part of the Partenariat territorial de la Montérégie-Ouest.