Alkan compiled his Esquisses, or Sketches, in 1861. The individual pieces that make up the set were probably written during the previous fifteen years. They were published in four volumes, with the pieces arranged in key sequence. The range of musical reference within them is very great indeed. For instance, Le staccatissimo (track 2) suggests links between the age of the French clavecinistes of the late seventeenth and early eighteenth centuries on the one hand, and Chopin and Schumann on the other. Confidence (track 9) evokes the form and texture of a Mendelssohn Song without Words, while Les soupirs (track 11) looks forward to Debussy. Esquisses ends with a postscript, Laus Deo, which evokes the solemn tolling of bells. This massive work is a fitting tribute to one of the nineteenth century’s master pianists.