Au cœur de l’étoile brings us back to our primordial origin: that “stardust” so poetically described by Hubert Reeves (1932-2023). Like stellar atoms that fuse to create new elements, the musical arcs of this piece were born from my fruitful collaboration with Quebec composer Denis Gougeon. A testament to sincere friendship, we navigate from one perspective to another on this melancholic and meditative theme. A theme that seems to resonate within us since the dawn of humanity.

Venetian composer of the early 18th century, Giovanni Battista Pescetti did not compose for the harp, like most of his contemporaries. Two centuries later, the renowned harpist Carlos Salzedo created a transcription of his Sonata in C minor, revealing this work under new light. At the heart of Nebulæ, this piece becomes its cornerstone: the genius of the past meets that of the present. It illustrates that despite our brief existence, we continually develop more refined tools to express ourselves and better understand our universe — like the harp, like the telescope.

An indispensable jewel of impressionist music, Clair de lune by Claude Debussy, from his Suite bergamasque, draws inspiration from our terrestrial satellite that fascinates so many artists: the moon. Like this music which aims to leave impressions rather than frank and direct ideas, the very notion of this lunar light is but a poetic illusion. Indeed, this beautiful round moon, riddled with meteorite impacts, emits no light : it merely reflects that of the sun.

The moon influences great movements of water : the tides, which makes Jeux d’eau by Carlos Salzedo a logical continuation of the previous piece by Claude Debussy. An extraordinary pedagogue and concert performer, Salzedo considerably enriched the harp repertoire with his own distinctive style. An innovative spirit, he developed a musical language that exploited to the fullest the possibilities of the modern harp mechanism, creating unprecedented effects that revolutionised the approach to this instrument.

Poet and musician of Greek mythology, Orpheus inspired countless artists through his talent, but also through the tragic outcome of his love story with Eurydice. Up to his constellation of the Lyre engraved in our celestial vault, Orpheus’s story exposes the fatality and tragedy of human existence, that anguish which drove us to invent belief systems to ease our condition. In this Dance of the Blessed Spirits from the opera Orfeo ed Euridice, C.W. Gluck presents a melancholic air as Orpheus pauses at the Elysian Fields before plunging into the abysses of Hades’ underworld.

In just a few pages, the Prelude by Gabriel Pierné introduces the entire reflection of Nebulæ. Originally written for piano, this work uses a wide register of the instrument, beginning and ending with an almost choral melody in the bass. Like the first fragments of our universe, this sonic magma explodes at its centre with two variations that offer us the brilliance of a spark, initiating reflection, thought.

Clair d’étoiles from the poetic suite La maison dans les dunes by Gabriel Dupont seems to me a logical continuation of Pierné’s Prelude. At the heart of this reflection initiated by the previous work, we turn our gaze towards the stars. These stars which are each in themselves suns for other celestial bodies, other planets. Eyes turned towards the firmament, the universe of possibilities opens to us. We are a magnificent chance occurrence in all this immensity.

Lux by Amélie Fortin evokes humanity facing celestial immensity, scrutinising those stars that flicker in the darkness. The music then guides us on an inverted journey, following stellar light from Earth to the explosion of a star. Amélie embodies for me an artistic kindred spirit, a person of such similar sensitivity to my own that each of our encounters becomes extraordinary. This commissioned work for Nebulæ marks our first official collaboration, the first step in a series that seems to impose itself naturally.

Valse romantique from the collection En vacances by Déodat de Sévérac offers a light respite through this journey of reflections. For me, it is a voyage to the heart of my youth, where I listened to the celebrated harpist Lily Laskine play these musical pages so poetically. De Sévérac described himself as a “musician-peasant,” giving himself the mission to depict his homeland, the dances, the harvests of his native France. One feels there all the vivacity of humanity, its attachment to its roots.

Du bist die Ruh by Franz Schubert, varied by Franz Liszt, offers us a moment of profound serenity. “You are repose,” says the German title, and this calm evokes for me what our acquired scientific knowledge brings us today : a better understanding of our universe. Through its successive variations, the work explores different facets of this tranquillity, like so many perspectives on the same cosmic mystery. This inner peace is born of knowledge, that light which gradually dispels our existential anxieties in the face of the immensity that surrounds us.

Valse romantique by Claude Debussy, composed in 1890 when the composer was only 28 years old, offers us a moment of Parisian elegance at the heart of this musical journey. This early work, imbued with the Belle Époque, reminds us that art transcends eras to touch upon the universal. Like galaxies spinning in their eternal cosmic dance, this waltz draws us into a circular movement where each revolution reveals new beauties.

It was whilst listening to one of my favourite pianists, Marc-André Hamelin, that I felt the urge to explore the touching Graceful Ghost Rag by William Bolcom. Resonating with a particular strand of my own story, the composer is said to have written this piece for his father, whose spirit he felt peacefully hovering around him when he was at the piano at night. My last solo album was woven around the departure of my father, such a defining figure in my musical journey. I remember one of our final conversations, where he confided that he would love to “see” inside musicians’ minds when they perform. Since then, I often think of him during my concerts: I see him comfortably settled in a corner of my thoughts, amused by what unfolds there. Music unites us beyond time, almost touching immortality.