Mese: novembre 2023

Lukinov Gramophone review review and Lagrasse festival

A full house for Nikita Lukinov at the Liberal Club with a display of a supreme stylist blessed with an elegance and a kaleidoscopic range of sounds.
Schumann’s Symphonic Studies that shone like newly minted jewels that astonishingly they could still take us by surprise with his sensitive artistry and passionate commitment.
Moulding such well known phrases into streams of sounds of ravishing beauty where even the posthumous studies seemed at last to have found their true home as he incorporated them into the whole with such sensitive intelligence.
Five of Tchaikowsky’s little pieces op 72 ,having such fun at the end of his life baking his little ‘pancakes’ ,were transformed into miniature tone poems of striking beauty and mastery.
Pletnev’s transcription of four pieces from Sleeping Beauty by contrast paled into insignificance even though played with the mastery that had held us mesmerised from this dashing young Russian who had flown down from his home in Glasgow to enchant and seduce us.
He is by the way the youngest staff member at The Royal Conservatory of Scotland and of all UK’s Music Conservatories.
He and his companion Anastasia ,a renowned novelist,are truly a golden couple who relish the Glaswegian air.

Nikita Lukinov plays breathtaking charity recital for Ukraine in Berlin.

Nikita Lukinov at St Marys The charm and aristocratic style of a star

Nikita Lukinov at St Mary’s a masterly warrior with canons covered in flowers

The Symphonic Studies Op. 13, began in 1834 as a theme and sixteen variations on a theme by Baron von Fricken, plus a further variation on an entirely different theme by Heinrich Marschner.The first edition in 1837 carried an annotation that the tune was “the composition of an amateur”: this referred to the origin of the theme, which had been sent to Schumann by Baron von Fricken, guardian of Ernestine von Fricken, the Estrella of his Carnaval op. 9. The baron, an amateur musician, had used the melody in a Theme with Variations for flute. Schumann had been engaged to Ernestine in 1834, only to break abruptly with her the year after. An autobiographical element is thus interwoven in the genesis of the Études symphoniques (as in that of many other works of Schumann’s).Of the sixteen variations Schumann composed on Fricken’s theme, only eleven were published by him. (An early version, completed between 1834 and January 1835, contained twelve movements). The final, twelfth, published étude was a variation on the theme from the Romance Du stolzes England freue dich (Proud England, rejoice!), from Heinrich Marschner’s opera Der Templer und die Judin based on Sir Walter Scott’s Ivanhoe (as a tribute to Schumann’s English friend, William Sterndale Bennett to whom it is dedicated )The earlier Fricken theme occasionally appears briefly during this étude. The work was first published in 1837 as XII Études Symphoniques. Only nine of the twelve études were specifically designated as variations. The entire work was dedicated to Schumann’s English friend, the pianist and composer, and Bennett played the piece frequently in England to great acclaim, but Schumann thought it was unsuitable for public performance and advised his wife Clara not to play it.The highly virtuosic demands of the piano writing are frequently aimed not merely at effect but at clarification of the polyphonic complexity and at delving more deeply into keyboard experimentation.

• Theme – Andante [C^♯ minor]
• Etude I (Variation 1) – Un poco più vivo [C^♯ minor]
• Etude II (Variation 2) – Andante [C^♯ minor]
• Etude III – Vivace [E Major]
• Etude IV (Variation 3) – Allegro marcato [C^♯ minor]
• Etude V (Variation 4) – Scherzando [C^♯ minor]
• Etude VI (Variation 5) – Agitato [C^♯ minor]
• Etude VII (Variation 6) – Allegro molto [E Major]
• Etude VIII (Variation 7) – Sempre marcatissimo [C^♯ minor]
• Etude IX – Presto possibile [C^♯ minor]
• Etude X (Variation 8) – Allegro con energia [C^♯ minor]
• Etude XI (Variation 9) – Andante espressivo [G^♯ minor]
• Etude XII (Finale) – Allegro brillante (based on Marschner’s theme) [D^♭ Major]

On republishing the set in 1890, Johannes Brahms restored the five variations that had been cut by Schumann. These are now often played, but in positions within the cycle that vary somewhat with each performance; there are now twelve variations and these five so-called “posthumous” variations which exist as a supplement.

The five posthumously published sections (all based on Fricken’s theme) are:

• Variation I – Andante, Tempo del tema
• Variation II – Meno mosso
• Variation III – Allegro
• Variation IV – Allegretto
• Variation V – Moderato.

In 1834, Schumann fell in love with Ernestine von Fricken, a piano student of Friedrich Wieck, and for a time they seemed destined to marry. The relationship did not last—Schumann got cold feet after he learned that she had been born out of wedlock—but it inspired some notable music. Carnaval, Op. 9, a set of character pieces for piano, is based on a four-note motive derived from the name of Ernestine’s home town. The Etudes symphoniques, Op. 13, are variations on a theme by Ernestine’s father, Ignaz Ferdinand von Fricken, a nobleman and amateur composer. Of course, Schumann eventually transferred his affections to Clara Wieck, and it was she who gave the first performance of the Etudes symphoniques, in 1837. The piece was published by Haslinger that same year, with a dedication to the English composer William Sterndale Bennett rather than to Ernestine. A revised version appeared in 1852.

Our manuscript is a sketch that includes the theme and variations 1, 2, 5, 10, 12, as well as five others that were not published until 1873, in an appendix edited by none other than Johannes Brahms. It formerly belonged to Alice Tully (1902–1993), the philanthropist whose name graces a concert hall in Lincoln Center. She gave it to Vladimir Horowitz (who counted Schumann’s music among his many specialties in the piano repertoire), and two years after his death, his widow Wanda Toscanini Horowitz donated it to Yale. The other principal manuscript source for this piece belongs to the library of the Royal Museum of Mariemont, in Belgium.

Tchaikovsky’s 18 Pieces (18 Morceaux), Op. 72 were his last works for solo piano, completed in April 1893 at Klin.Returning to Klin on 3/15 February 1893 after a long period of absence, Tchaikovsky straight away set to work on composing his Symphony n.6 At around this time he also assembled materials which were to form the basis for a series of piano pieces. On 5/17 February the composer told his brother Modest : “In the meantime, in order to earn some money, I will compose a few piano pieces and romances”

Tchaikovsky only began to compose these pieces in April, after completing the sketches of his Symphony n.6 and fulfilling a number of concert engagements, from which he returned on 5/17 April 1893.On 5/17 April 1893, Tchaikovsky wrote to ilya Slatin from Klin :’I have been on holiday in Saint Petersburg with my family, which was very nice. I came back today and began collecting my thoughts to compose a whole series of miniature

By 15/27 April, ten pieces had already been written. “In the 10 days since returning from Petersburg , I have decided, for the want of money, to write a few little piano pieces, and have conditioned myself to write at least one a day during this month”, Tchaikovsky wrote to Ilya Slatin on 15/27 April :”I’m continuing to bake my musical pancakes”, he wrote on the same day to Vladimir Davydov : “Today the tenth is being prepared. It’s remarkable that the further I get, the easier and more enjoyable the job becomes. At the beginning it went slowly, and the first two or three items were merely the result of an effort of will, but now I cannot stop my ideas, which appear to me one after another, at all hours of the day”

Some superb playing advertised as a duo but they truly played as one.Have the etherial passionate sounds of these last utterings of Debussy ever sounded so fresh and improvised?There was magic in the air with the lightness and insinuating sounds of the second movement that were rediscovered together as though for the first time .The concealed passion and throbbing heart beat of the last movement drew this world – Debussy’s – to a conclusion in only thirteen minutes.There was passion too in the Grieg sonata but it was the heartrending intimacy that was so touching. Looking at each other and both on the same wave just waiting for each other to emerge and submerge with a continual movement.Each swaying with the music indeed as Chopin said :the roots firmly in the ground but the branches free to move in the breeze.I did not think the ravishing beauty of Jae Hong’s Allegretto could be more lovingly tender or beautiful but then Esther’s violin took over with different sounds less luminous but of even greater intensity.An exhilarating prestissimo was played with extraordinary rhythmic energy bringing these two Sonatas to a magnificent end.Rachmaninov’s Vocalise was pure magic as the violin gently conversed with the piano in a duet of ravishing beauty but also of extraordinary balance.Jae Hong playing with the piano lid fully opened but there was never any moment when he might have overpowered this single violin.Two superb musicians listening to each other as they created a single unified whole .A lesson in humility and artistry as they thought more of the music they were making together than themselves.Yankee Doodle was a way to release the tension that had been created by so much wonderful music making.Jae Hong patiently accompanying the hi jinx of his partner and every so often letting the brass band in his hands and feet take over ……it was fun but it was the desolate Korean Melody and the deeply nostalgic Morning Song by Elgar that stole our hearts.

Jae Hong Park at Steinway Hall

The Debussy sonata for violin and piano in G minor, L.140, was written in 1917. It was the composer’s last major composition.The premiere took place on 5 May 1917, the violin part played by Gaston Poulet , with Debussy himself at the piano. It was his last public performance.

The work has three movements:

1. Allegro vivo
2. Intermède: Fantasque et léger
3. Finale: Très animé

The unfinished sonatas

Six sonatas for various instruments (French: Six sonates pour divers instruments) was a projected cycle of sonatas that was interrupted by the composer’s death in 1918, after he had composed only half of the projected sonatas. He left behind his sonatas for cello and piano 1915), flute, viola and harp (1915), and violin and piano (1916–1917).Debussy wrote in the manuscript of his violin sonata that the fourth sonata should be written for oboe, horn,and harpsichord and the fifth for trumpet, clarinet, bassoon and piano.

From 1914, the composer, encouraged by the music publisher Jacques Durand intended to write a set of six sonatas for various instruments, in homage to the French composers of the 18th century. The effects of the First World War and an interest in baroque composers Couperin and Rameau inspired Debussy as he was writing the sonatas.

Durand, in his memoirs entitled Quelques souvenirs d’un éditeur de musique, wrote the following about the sonatas’ origin:

‘After his famous String Quartet, Debussy had not written any more chamber music. Then, at the Concerts Durand, he heard again the Septet with trumpet by Saint-Saëns and his sympathy for this means of musical expression was reawoken. He admitted the fact to me and I warmly encouraged him to follow his inclination. And that is how the idea of the six sonatas for various instruments came about.^’

In a letter to the conductor Bernard Molinari, Debussy explained that the set should include “different combinations, with the last sonata combining the previously used instruments”. His death on 25 March 1918 prevented him from carrying out his plan, and only three of the six sonatas were completed and published by Durand, with a dedication to his second wife, Emma Bardac.

For the final and sixth sonata, Debussy envisioned a concerto where the sonorities of the “various instruments” combine, with the gracious assistance of the double bass.

Grieg began composing his third and final violin sonata in the autumn of 1886. Whereas the first two sonatas were written in a matter of weeks, this sonata took him several months to complete.Although there were only two years between the first two violin sonatas, the Violin Sonata No 3 in C minor, Op 45, was not to follow for almost two decades: the last piece of chamber music Grieg completed, it was composed—at Grieg’s home, Troldhaugen, outside Bergen—in the second half of 1886, just spilling into the first days of 1887.The sonata is in three movements The second movement opens with a serene piano solo in E major with a lyrical melodic line. In the middle section, Grieg uses a playful dance tune. It also exists in a version for cello and piano that Grieg composed during the same time as the violin version and given to his brother as a birthday gift in May 1887, but appeared in print only in 2005 (by Henle).

Allegro molto ed appassionato – Allegretto espressivo alla Romanza – Allegro animato – Prestissimo 

The sonata remains the most popular of the three works, and has established itself in the standard repertoire. The work was also a personal favorite of Grieg’s. Grieg played the piano part in the premiere, in the Leipzig Gewandhaus on 10 December 1887; the violinist was the eminent Adolph Brodsky, who had given the first performance of the Tchaikovsky Concerto six years earlier (and was later head of the Royal Manchester School of Music)To a certain extent, Grieg built on Norwegian folk melodies and rhythms in this three-movement sonata. However, Grieg considered the second sonata as the “Norwegian” sonata, while the third sonata was “the one with the broader horizon.” This was the last piece Grieg composed using sonata form.

“Vocalise” is a song composed and published in 1915 as the last of his 14 Songs or 14 Romances, Op.34.Written for high voice (soprano or tenor)it contains no words, but is sung using only one vowel of the singer’s choosing It was dedicated to soprano singer Antonina Nezhdanova. It is performed in various instrumental arrangements more frequently than in the original vocal version.In this case arranged by Jascha Heifetz.

The French violinist Henri Vieuxtemps wrote Souvenir d’Amérique, opus 17 for violin and piano, in 1843, during his first concert tour in the United States. This set of variations, based on the melody of the popular song Yankee Doodle, became the entertaining surprise encore piece at Vieuxtemps’ recitals. Its humorous spirit, together with its virtuosic firework displays and imaginative use of playing techniques, made Souvenir d’Amérique an instant audience favorite.

Cristian Sandrin triumphs last night in Berlin with the ‘Goldberg Variations’ dedicated to his father the distinguished pianist and pedagogue Sandu Sandrin who would have been 77 years old this day.A commemoration for him a year on took place in Bucharest on the 5th November (the actual day is the 15th )

Cristian Sandrin Visions of Life dedicated to his father Sandu Sandrin .

Cristian Sandrin plays Goldberg Variations the start of a lifetime journey of discovery from Perivale to Bucharest

A history of the Konzerthaus Berlin.

Designed by the famous Prussian architect Karl Friedrich Schinkel, who oversaw the rebuilding of Berlin after Napoleon’s comprehensive defeat at Leipzig and Waterloo. The concert hall is in restrained and elegant Noclassical style, the perfect setting for the music of the period. It was ceremoniously opened in 1821 with a prologue specially written by Goethe and saw the premiere of Carl Maria von Weber’s opera Der Freischütz. Prussia was determined that Berlin would vie with Vienna and Prague as the cultural centre of Europe.
The building was completely destroyed by fire in the last weeks of World War 2 and Berliners were torn with whether to faithfully rebuild Schinkel’s masterpiece or build a modern concert hall. We can only be grateful that they chose the former option that recaptures the moment when the Age of Enlightenment meets the spirit of Romanticism.

Cristian’s rendering of the Goldberg Variations could not have taken place at a more fitting venue. The packed audience was hypnotised by the performance. After Cristian had soaked up the rapturous applause and the shouts of bravo, bravo he said it had been the best moment in all his life.

Photos show the Kleinersalle, the Bechstein concert grand – which had been tuned to perfection – the bells rang and the keys sang. Cristian loved the piano.

Photos of Dr. Rainer Braunschweig with Gerlinde Otto, Professor at the University of Music Franz Liszt in Weimar since 1992 and now emeritus lecturer.

https://bachtrack.com/interview-cristian-sandrin-new-goldberg-variations-bach-kettner-society-december-2024/amp=1

The ‘Spotlight’ was certainly on St John’s Waterloo tonight with a superb concert by Hyeoon Park and Benjamin Grosvenor
Superb chamber music playing each listening to the other as they played with cat and mouse like attention.

A continuous stream of music making that was like circus entertainers on the high wire who with superb balance and control manage to stay on high without ever even the thought that they might fall off. Ravishing sumptuous sounds from the piano were matched by the searing intensity of the violin.
From the piano’s very first sombre chords of quiet brooding intensity in the Vaughan Williams the violin just soared into the heights.A magic spell was cast from the Lark allowed to ascend into truly celestial regions on high.
Passing through Takemitsu’s evocative ‘Distance de fée’ we were treated to an astonishingly insinuating performance of the Debussy Sonata that was a very welcome addition to the programme .It was remarkable for its ravishing colour and passionate intensity.
Even Grieg’s C minor Sonata was played with the care,burning intensity and intelligent musicianship usually reserved only for the ‘Kreutzer’.
A monumental performance where the piano’s heart rending delicacy in the second movement was matched by the ravishing intensity of the violin.
A magnificent performance of a much neglected work that tonight was restored to all it’s glory by these two great artists that was eagerly devoured by all those lucky to be present.

But the best was still to come with a heart rending performance of Elgar’s ‘Salut D’Amour’ that will remain in my memory for long to come.

The Debussy sonata for violin and piano in G minor, L.140, was written in 1917. It was the composer’s last major composition.The premiere took place on 5 May 1917, the violin part played by Gaston Poulet , with Debussy himself at the piano. It was his last public performance.

The work has three movements:

1. Allegro vivo
2. Intermède: Fantasque et léger
3. Finale: Très animé

The unfinished sonatas

Six sonatas for various instruments (French: Six sonates pour divers instruments) was a projected cycle of sonatas that was interrupted by the composer’s death in 1918, after he had composed only half of the projected sonatas. He left behind his sonatas for cello and piano 1915), flute, viola and harp (1915), and violin and piano (1916–1917).Debussy wrote in the manuscript of his violin sonata that the fourth sonata should be written for oboe, horn,and harpsichord and the fifth for trumpet, clarinet, bassoon and piano.

From 1914, the composer, encouraged by the music publisher Jacques Durand intended to write a set of six sonatas for various instruments, in homage to the French composers of the 18th century. The effects of the First World War and an interest in baroque composers Couperin and Rameau inspired Debussy as he was writing the sonatas.

Durand, in his memoirs entitled Quelques souvenirs d’un éditeur de musique, wrote the following about the sonatas’ origin:

‘After his famous String Quartet, Debussy had not written any more chamber music. Then, at the Concerts Durand, he heard again the Septet with trumpet by Saint-Saëns and his sympathy for this means of musical expression was reawoken. He admitted the fact to me and I warmly encouraged him to follow his inclination. And that is how the idea of the six sonatas for various instruments came about.^’

In a letter to the conductor Bernard Molinari, Debussy explained that the set should include “different combinations, with the last sonata combining the previously used instruments”. His death on 25 March 1918 prevented him from carrying out his plan, and only three of the six sonatas were completed and published by Durand, with a dedication to his second wife, Emma Bardac.

For the final and sixth sonata, Debussy envisioned a concerto where the sonorities of the “various instruments” combine, with the gracious assistance of the double bass.

Grieg began composing his third and final violin sonata in the autumn of 1886. Whereas the first two sonatas were written in a matter of weeks, this sonata took him several months to complete.Although there were only two years between the first two violin sonatas, the Violin Sonata No 3 in C minor, Op 45, was not to follow for almost two decades: the last piece of chamber music Grieg completed, it was composed—at Grieg’s home, Troldhaugen, outside Bergen—in the second half of 1886, just spilling into the first days of 1887.The sonata is in three movements The second movement opens with a serene piano solo in E major with a lyrical melodic line. In the middle section, Grieg uses a playful dance tune. It also exists in a version for cello and piano that Grieg composed during the same time as the violin version and given to his brother as a birthday gift in May 1887, but appeared in print only in 2005 (by Henle).

Allegro molto ed appassionato – Allegretto espressivo alla Romanza – Allegro animato – Prestissimo

The sonata remains the most popular of the three works, and has established itself in the standard repertoire. The work was also a personal favorite of Grieg’s. Grieg played the piano part in the premiere, in the Leipzig Gewandhaus on 10 December 1887; the violinist was the eminent Adolph Brodsky, who had given the first performance of the Tchaikovsky Concerto six years earlier (and was later head of the Royal Manchester School of Music)To a certain extent, Grieg built on Norwegian folk melodies and rhythms in this three-movement sonata. However, Grieg considered the second sonata as the “Norwegian” sonata, while the third sonata was “the one with the broader horizon.” This was the last piece Grieg composed using sonata form.

The Lark Ascending was inspired by the 1881 poem by the English writer George Meredith . It was originally for violin and piano, completed in 1914, but not performed until 1920. The composer reworked it for solo violin and orchestra after the First World War and it is this version, in which the work is chiefly known, was first performed in 1921.

The composer’s second wife, Ursula wrote that in The Lark Ascending Vaughan Williams had “taken a literary idea on which to build his musical thought … and had made the violin become both the bird’s song and its flight, being, rather than illustrating the poem from which the title was taken”.At the head of the score, Vaughan Williams wrote out twelve lines from Meredith’s 122-line poem:

He rises and begins to round,
He drops the silver chain of sound,
Of many links without a break,
In chirrup, whistle, slur and shake.

For singing till his heaven fills,
‘Tis love of earth that he instils,
And ever winging up and up,
Our valley is his golden cup
And he the wine which overflows
to lift us with him as he goes.

Till lost on his aerial rings
In light, and then the fancy sings.

The soloist for whom the work was written and to whom it is dedicated was Marie Hall ,a leading British violinist of the time, a former pupil of Edward Elgar and celebrated for her interpretation of that composer’s violin concerto ^.She gave the first performance with the pianist Geoffrey Mendham (1899–1984) at the Shirehampton Hall on 15 December 1920 and was again the soloist in the first performance of the orchestral version, in the Queen’s Hall , London, on 14 June 1921, at a concert presented by the British Music Society. The british Symphony Orchestra was conducted by Adrian Boult

“Distance de fée” created in 1951, one of the best pieces of Takemitsu’s early period. The spirit of Debussy and Messiaen are fully felt in this work of approximately 7 and 1/2 minutes duration. Messiaen’s octatonic scale is used in the tonal language. The opening lyrical theme is repeated several times, and finds a new pathway upon each return – this is a version of variation as well as rondo form, two of Takemitsu’s favorite compositional procedures. This piece, like many others by Takemitsu, was inspired by poetry, in this case, a poem of the same title by Shuzo Takiguchi (1903-1979). This work describes, with lightly mythological imagery, an elusive, transparent creature living in “air’s labyrinth … it lives in the spring breeze That barely resembled the balance of a small bird”

Elgar’s Salut d’Amour (Liebesgruß), Op. 12 was written in July 1888, when he was romantically involved with Caroline Alice Roberts and he called it “Liebesgruss” (‘Love’s Greeting’) because of Miss Roberts’ fluency in German. On their engagement she had already presented him with a poem “The Wind at Dawn ” which he set to music and, when he returned home to London on 22 September from a holiday he gave her Salut d’Amour as an engagement present.The dedication was in French: “à Carice”. “Carice” was a combination of his wife’s names Caroline Alice, and was the name to be given to their daughter born two years later.Salut d’amour” is one of Elgar’s best-known works and has inspired numerous arrangements for widely varying instrumental combinations. There are also versions with lyrics in different languages, for example the song “Woo thou, Sweet Music” with words by A. C. Bunten,^[5] and “Violer” (Pansies) in Swedish.

Benjamin Grosvenor at the Proms The reincarnation of the Golden Age of piano playing

Johann Sebastian Bach Partita No 6 in E minor
1. Toccata
2. Allemande
3. Corrente
4. Air
5. Sarabande
6. Tempo di Gavotta
7. Gigue
Karol Szymanowski Mazurkas, Op 50
No 3 Moderato
No 7 Poco vivace
No 8 Moderato
No 5 Moderato
No 4 Allegramente, risoluto

Anton Webern Variations, Op 27
Ludwig van Beethoven Piano Sonata No 31
1. Moderato cantabile, molto espressivo
2. Allegro molto
3. Adagio, ma non troppo – Arioso dolente – Fuga: Allegro, ma non troppo – L’istesso tempo di Arioso – L’inversione della Fuga

Performances of ravishing beauty with a kaleidoscope of sounds.An extraordinary palette of colours that gave new life to Bach’s monumental 6th Partita.There was delicacy and poise but nobility and clarity always with refined good taste and with very little use of the pedal.His fingers seemed instinctively to search out sounds and colours without ever disturbing the overall pulse or architectural shape.
A whispered luminosity he brought to Szymanowski’s extraordinary Mazurkas op 50.A subtle world of insinuating sounds and dance rhythms.
This was the ideal world for Webern’s variations too where the delicacy and multicoloured sounds drew these seemingly isolated notes into shapes of eloquence giving meaning to such a seemingly abstract art.There were pungent sounds too but rarely called upon as Anderewski inhabited a secret world that he chose to allow us to eavesdrop on.
A change of piano during the interval but the palette of sounds and whispered secrets were still the same .
Beethoven too slipped in on the final ethereal wave of the Webern variations.
But by now we had experienced his secret world of refined multicoloured sounds and in some way I found in need of something with more backbone and contrast.
This was Beethoven as seen from afar.A world of ravishing beauty and refined whispered sounds but was it the real Beethoven if we moved in closer?
An audience that sat in awed silence as he drew us in to a secret world that even the three encores inhabited.(Bach and Bartok)
The only chiselled sounds above mezzo forte were momentarily in the Beethoven Scherzo but with hard ungrateful sounds that had no place in the world he inhabited.
A final note of the evening hammered into the bass which reminded me of his Schumann Piano Concerto that he had played with Pappano with such chiselled ungrateful sounds that I turned to a friend and said I thought he must hate it.It was obviously not part of the world that he inhabits.
A master pianist and a cult figure with a great following of admirers but who lives on a cloud of his own of extremes of sound that somehow do not always seem to connect.
A concert inhabited by Eusebius ………but Florestan where were you!
A concert full of wondrous things and a unique world that is wonderful to visit occasionally but a world where it would be hard to take up permanent residence.
A standing ovation for a unique artist and I too found myself on my feet.
Chapeau Maestro!

The Barbican presents Piotr Anderszewski:

From Bach to Webern, pianist Piotr Anderszewski finds fascinating connections between composers whose visionary ideas would change keyboard music forever.

Anderszewski is renowned for his interpretations of Bach and brings that special affinity to the monumental Partita No 6 which, in the words of musicologist David Schulenberg, is ‘the crowning work of the set and Bach’s greatest suite’. Rooted in traditional European dance styles, this is music that reveals Bach’s awe-inspiring ability to weave whole worlds of sound from the simplest ideas.
Fast forward 200 years, and Szymanowski – from Anderszewski’s homeland of Poland – infuses his mazurkas with the mind-bending rhythms and melodies of Polish folk dance. With his Variations, Webern takes an historical form and places it firmly in the 20th century, and Beethoven brings us full circle in his emotional penultimate piano sonata – a piece with echoes of Bach but that’s peppered with Romantic innovations.

Piotr Anderszewski is an artist who has long embraced the unexpected, whether in his repertoire choices or his interpretations. Bach has long been central to his art, but always with a fresh slant – as in his most recent recording of the composer’s music, where he boldly took selected preludes and fugues from the Second Book of the 48 and presented them in his own re-ordering.

Bach’s E minor Partita, BWV830 – the final one in a set of six that the composer proudly published as his ‘opus 1’ in 1731. Although it’s actually one of the earlier partitas to have been written, it’s easy to see why Bach placed it last, with its striking combination of sweeping brilliance and profundity.

For one of the greatest colourists of the 20th century, Karol Szymanowski the piano functioned as both inspiration and musical laboratory throughout his composing life. The 20 Mazurkas of Op 50 (1924–5), from which we hear Nos 3, 7, 8, 5 and 4, are from the final phase of Szymanowski’s style, one in which his own musical language became inextricably suffused with Polish nationalism.

A decade later Anton Webern was taking piano writing to a new level of concision in his Variations, Op 27 (1936). Webern was a member of the Second Viennese School, the movement founded by Arnold Schoenberg whose founding principle was that of ‘serialism’ (in which, unlike in time-honoured system of traditional tonality, all 12 notes of the chromatic scale are used to create a ‘row’ or ‘series’, determining not only the melodic lines of a piece but also its harmonies).

Webern’s three brief movements are all built from the same tone row.The yearning opening phrases of the first movement, via the capricious spikely energetic second, to the contrasts within the last, from introspection to buoyancy.

Beethoven’s A flat major Sonata, Op 110, was his penultimate sonata, written in 1821,

The outward gentleness of the opening movement belies its tautness of form, and the contrast with the brief second, a scherzo marked Allegro molto – capricious, gruffly humorous, even violent – is extreme. Beethoven subversively sneaks in references to two street songs popular at the time: Unsa Kätz häd Katzln ghabt (‘Our cat has had kittens’) and Ich bin lüderlich, du bist lüderlich (‘I’m dissolute, you’re dissolute’)! 

But it’s in the finale that the weight of the sonata lies, and it begins with a declamatory, recitative-like passage that starts in the minor, moving to an emotionally pained aria-like section.Beethoven introduces a quietly authoritative fugue, based on a theme reminiscent of the one that opened the sonata. Its progress interrupted by the aria once more, its line now disjunct and almost sobbing for breath. The way in which the composer moves into the major via a sequence of G major chords is a passage of pure radiance, that Edwin Fischer described as ‘like a reawakening heartbeat’. This leads to a second appearance of the fugue in inversion culminating in a magnificently triumphant conclusion.

Piotr Anderszewski is regarded as one of the outstanding musicians of his generation. 

He appears regularly in recital at such concert halls as the Vienna Konzerthaus, Berlin Philharmonie, Wigmore Hall, Carnegie Hall, Théâtre des Champs-Élysées and Concertgebouw Amsterdam. His collaborations with orchestra have included appearances with the Berlin Philharmonic, Berlin Staatskapelle, London and NHK Symphony orchestras and Philharmonia Orchestra. He has also placed a special emphasis on playing and directing, working with Scottish Chamber Orchestra, Chamber Orchestra of Europe and Camerata Salzburg, among others. 

He has been an exclusive artist with Warner Classics/Erato (previously Virgin Classics) since 2000. His first recording for the label was Beethoven’s Diabelli Variations, which went on to receive a number of prizes. He has also recorded Grammy-nominated discs of Bach’s Partitas Nos 1, 3 and 6 and Szymanowski’s solo piano works, the latter receiving a Gramophone Award in 2006. His recording devoted to works by Robert Schumann received BBC Music Magazine’s Record of the Year Award in 2012. His disc of Bach’s English Suites Nos 1, 3 and 5, released in 2014, went on to win Gramophone and ECHO Klassik awards in 2015. His most recent release, featuring a selection of Preludes and Fugues from Bach’s Well-Tempered Clavier Book 2, won a Gramophone Award in 2021. 

The intensity and originality of his interpretations have been recognised with the Gilmore Award, the Szymanowski Prize and a Royal Philharmonic Society Award. 

He has also been the subject of several documentaries by the film maker Bruno Monsaingeon. Piotr Anderszewski plays Diabelli Variations (2001) explores his particular relationship with Beethoven’s iconic work, while Unquiet Traveller (2008) is an unusual artist portrait, capturing Piotr Anderszewski’s reflections on music, performance and his Polish-Hungarian roots. 

In 2016 he got behind the camera himself to explore his relationship with his native Warsaw, creating a film entitled Je m’appelle Varsovie. 

Last season he gave a new recital programme at the Philharmonie de Paris, Vienna Musikverein, Alte Oper Frankfurt and other major concert halls in Europe and Asia. He also performed with leading orchestras including the Leipzig Gewandhausorchester, Kammerakademie Potsdam, Finnish Radio and NHK Symphony orchestras and Orchestre Philharmonique de Radio France. 

This season includes solo recitals throughout Europe at prestigious venues including the Muziekgebouw Amsterdam, Konserthuset Stockholm, Gulbenkian Portugal and Philharmonie Cologne, as well as on tour in Japan and Singapore. Concerto highlights include concerts with the Zurich Tonhalle, NDR Hamburg, Taiwan Symphony Orchestra and a tour with Sinfonia Varsovia.

Ashley Fripp’s 37th appearance at St Mary’s since 2005 was marked quite rightly by an unusually full and appreciative audience.Ashley is one of the finest most serious musicians I know who I had first encountered in the village of Sermoneta in Italy where every year during the summer months the Pontine Festival brings some of the greatest musicians to the hills near to Rome to give concerts and masterclasses.A festival that had started in the ‘60’s with Yehudi Menuhin and Josef Szigeti and every year since brings great music to where I luckily have a holiday home on the seashore.He had come to study with Eliso Virsaladze,the great Russian pianist and pedagogue much admired by Sviatoslav Richter.It was she who pointed out to me a young very talented British boy who had joined her class and she was very impressed by his pianistic and musical artistry.I later found Ashley in Fiesole overlooking Florence where Eliso was holding her masterclasses five times a year.Ashley was already on the threshold of a career in music in London ,having won the Gold medal at the Guildhall School of Music ,but was still keen to perfect his skills with one of the greatest musicians of our time.

Ashley Fripp in Florence – A walk to the Paradise Garden

While he was there he also gave a recital in the Harold Acton Library,part of the British Institute ,where he gave a truly memorable performance of Chopin’s B minor Sonata.It was he who introduced me to this beautiful venue and the director and thanks to him we now hold a series of concerts there every year for the Keyboard Trust.

Today Ashley presented two major works and his eloquent introductions illuminated the journey we were about to take together with simple clarity and intelligence.It was the same qualities that he brought to his performances with superb technical control and artistry.An architectural shape to all he did and an impeccable sense of style that made for a great contrast from the non legato world of Bach where the song and the dance reign to the sumptuous romantic sounds of Rachmaninov. But even in Rachmaninov he was able to link the ten miniature tone poems or preludes into one emotional whole.As he pointed out there was a link between the first prelude in the minor and last in the major with the first prelude in F sharp minor and the last in G flat ( F sharp) major.The same sense of unity and form that Bach had brought to his Partita Ashley’s superb musicianship could see in Rachmaninov too.Superbly played throughout without any showmanship but with simplicity and an attention to the composers wishes that gave great strength and authority to all he did .

British pianist Ashley Fripp has performed extensively as recitalist, concerto soloist and chamber musician throughout Europe, Asia, North America, Africa and Australia in many of the world’s most prestigious concert halls. Highlights include the Carnegie Hall (New York), Musikverein (Vienna), Concertgebouw (Amsterdam), the Philharmonie halls of Cologne, Paris, Luxembourg and Warsaw, the Bozar (Brussels), the Royal Festival, Barbican and Wigmore Halls (London), the Laeiszhalle (Hamburg), Palace of Arts (Budapest), the Megaron (Athens), Konzerthaus Dortmund, the Gulbenkian Auditorium (Lisbon) and the Konserthus (Stockholm). 

He has won prizes at more than a dozen national and international competitions, including at the Hamamatsu (Japan), Birmingham and Leeds International Piano Competitions, the Royal Over-Seas League Competition, the Concours Européen de Piano (France) and the coveted Gold Medal from the Guildhall School of Music & Drama. Ashley was awarded the Worshipful Company of Musicians’ highest award, The Prince’s Prize, and was chosen as a ‘Rising Star’ by the European Concert Hall Organisation (ECHO). He has also performed in the Chipping Campden, Edinburgh, Brighton, Bath, Buxton, City of London, and St. Magnus International Festivals as well as the Oxford International Piano Festival, the Festival Pontino di Musica (Italy) and the Powsin International Piano Festival (Poland). Ashley also gave an open-air Chopin recital beside the world-famous Chopin monument in Warsaw’s Royal Lazienki Park to an audience of 2,500 people. 

Ashley Fripp studied at the Guildhall School of Music & Drama with Ronan O’Hora and with Eliso Virsaladze at the Scuola di Musica di Fiesole (Italy). In 2021 he was awarded a doctorate for his research into the piano music of British composer Thomas Adès. Future engagements include his debut at the Mecklenburg-Vorpommern Festival (Germany) and a commercial film production of Rachmaninoff Piano Concertos Nos. 1 & 2 with accompanying concert tours in Germany and the Czech Republic with the Prague International Youth Orchestra.

The Partita for keyboard No. 2 in C minor, BWV.826, is a suite of six movements written for the .It was announced in 1727,issued individually, and then published as Bach’s Clavier-Ubung in 1731.

Ten Preludes, op 23, was composed in 1901 and 1903. Together with the Prelude in C sharp minor op 3/2 and the 13 Preludes op 32 this set is part of a full suite of 24 preludes in all the major and minor keys.Rachmaninoff completed Prelude No. 5 in 1901. The remaining preludes were completed after Rachmaninoff’s marriage to his cousin Natalia Satina: Nos. 1, 4, and 10 premiered in Moscow on February 10, 1903, and the remaining seven were completed soon thereafter.The years 1900–1903 were difficult for Rachmaninoff and his motivation for writing the Preludes was predominantly financial.He composed the works in the Hotel America, financially dependent on his cousin Alexander Siloti , to whom the Preludes are dedicated.Of the comparative popularity of his Ten Preludes and his early Prelude op.3 n.2 ,a favourite of audiences, Rachmaninoff remarked: “…I think the Preludes of Op. 23 are far better music than my first Prelude, but the public has shown no disposition to share in my belief….”The composer never played all of the Preludes in one sitting, instead performing selections of them, consisting of preludes from both his Op. 23 and Op. 32 sets which were of contrasting character

Ashley Fripp ignites Bach and Chopin with supreme artistry and musicianship

Ashley Fripp at St Mary’s poetry and intelligence of a great musician

• Serghei Rachmaninov 1873 -1943
  • Suite from Violin Partita in E by JS Bach:
  • –II. Gavotte

• George Xiaoyuan Fu b. 1991
  • Transformation on Gigue from Bach’s Violin Partita No. 2

• Matthew Aucoin b. 1990
  • The tracks have vanished (world première) Commissioned by the Irving S. Gilmore Piano Festival for Kirill Gerstein

• Claude Debussy 1862-1918
  • Etudes Book I:
  • –Pour les cinq doigts
  • –Pour les tierces

• Etudes Book II:
• –Pour les agréments
• –Pour les sonorités opposées
• –Pour les arpèges composés

• Etudes Book I:
• –Pour les octaves
• –Pour les huit doigts

Etudes are an endless source of fascination, inviting composers to push both physical and musical possibilities – from the ethereal to the virtuosic. George Xiaoyuan Fu presents Debussy’s Etudes alongside three works by pianist-composers that discover possibilities through transcriptions for solo piano.

Promoted by the Royal Academy of Music

The amazing Mr Fu must be amongst these Fra Angelico Ognissanti as after all it is All Saints today.
Lent to the Wigmore Hall by the Royal Academy for a lunchtime concert where he astonished and amazed us with his superhuman feats of musical trickery and mastery.
The centre piece an absolutely mind boggling world premiere of a ‘friend ‘ Matthew Aucoin.Just a years’difference united them and it would need a year for any mortal to master a work of such diabolical intricacy.
George only early thirties with degrees from Harvard,Curtis ,a Fellowship from the Royal Academy and recently married amazes and delights us all with his simple open intelligence and complete mastery of music matters.
He is also one of the nicest people I know and I am proud to call a friend.
The only defect is his applauding with hands raised high, so be sure to never sit behind him in a concert !

Claude Debussy’s Études ( L 136) are a set of 12 études composed in 1915. Debussy described them as “a warning to pianists not to take up the musical profession unless they have remarkable hands”.They are broadly considered his late masterpieces.

George Fu his joy and exhilaration saves the day and uplifts our spirits

George X Fu ravishing the senses as a young eagle descends on St Mary’s

Beautiful music surrounded by magnificent paintings and played by a beautiful young pianist .

Thank you Mary Orr for arranging such a treat for Halloween.
In the sumptuous Matthiesen Gallery in Mayfair Varvara Tarasova started her programme with the shortest but most mellifluous Sonata by Schubert of pure innocent beauty.
Schumann’s monumental Carnaval filled this rarified atmosphere with a parade of mignons aided and abetted by Schumann’s duel characters of Florestan and Eusebius.
Scintillating charm and exquisite playing of two of Liszt’s most beguiling miniatures:.Liszt’s irresistible elaboration of Schubert with his Soirées de Vienne n.6 and one of his three concert studies ,La Leggerezza,completed this oasis of peace and beauty on La notte delle streghe (The witches sabbath)
Rain and confusion all around but reinforced by such beauty after only an hour we are ready to go into battle in the big city outside.

The Piano Sonata in A major D.664, op posth 120 was written in the summer of 1819.The manuscript, completed in July 1819, was dedicated to Josephine von Koller of Steyr in Upper Austria, whom he considered to be “very pretty” and “a good pianist”. The lyrical, buoyant, in spots typically poignant nature of this sonata fits the image of a young Schubert in love, living in a summery Austrian countryside, which he also considered to be “unimaginably lovely”.

Liszt was very fond of the Soirées and they featured in many of his performances in the mid-19th century. His Soirée No. 6 in A minor was based on themes from Schubert’s 12 Valses nobles, D.969, and Valses sentimentales, D.779, and was revised at least twice. The final revision, done in 1869, was said to be part of the last recital he gave in Luxembourg, in July 1886. The 1869 revision was made for his pupil, Sophie Menter, who, after the death of Liszt was ‘regarded by some as the incarnation of Liszt’. Liszt himself proclaimed Menter as his successor (on the other hand, she wasn’t the only one of his pupils that he so declared).In the Liszt cycle Soirées de Vienne, composed between 1846 and 1852, Liszt looked at Schubert’s dances for his inspiration. He chose Schubert’s Waltzes, Ländler, Ecossaisen, and German dances, all of which were Viennese dances in ¾ time. For the nine parts of the Soirées, Liszt chose themes from Schubert’s 38 Waltzes, Ländler, and Ecossaises, D.145 (composed 1815–1821); 36 Originaltänze, D.365; Wiener Damen-Ländler und Ecossaisen, D.734 (1816–1821); Valses sentimentales, D.779 (ca 1823); 18 German Dances and Ecossaises, D.783 (1823-1824); and 12 Valses nobles, D.969 (1826).

Three Concert Études (Trois études de concert), S 144,were composed between 1845–49 and published in Paris as Trois caprices poétiques with the three individual titles as they are known today.

As the title indicates, they are intended not only for the acquisition of a better technique, but also for concert performance. Liszt was himself a virtuoso pianist and was able to easily play many complex patterns generally considered difficult. The Italian subtitles now associated with the études—Il lamento (“The Lament”), La leggierezza (“Lightness”), and Un sospiro (“A sigh”)—first appeared in the French edition.

Carnaval. Scènes mignonnes sur quatre notes Robert Schumann 

Carnaval had its origin in a set of variations on a Sehnsuchtswalzer by Franz Schubert , whose music Schumann had discovered only in 1827. The catalyst for writing the variations may have been a work for piano and orchestra by Schumann’s close friend Ludwig Schuncke,a set of variations on the same Schubert theme. Schumann felt that Schuncke’s heroic treatment was an inappropriate reflection of the tender nature of the Schubert piece, so he set out to approach his variations in a more intimate way, working on them in 1833 and 1834.

Schumann’s work was never completed, however, and Schuncke died in December 1834, but he did re-use the opening 24 measures for the opening of Carnaval. 

The 21 pieces are connected by a recurring motif . The four notes are encoded puzzles, and Schumann predicted that “deciphering my masked ball will be a real game for you.”

Both Schumann and his wife Clara considered his solo piano works too difficult for the general public. ( Chopin is reported to have said that Carnaval was not music at all.Chopin did not warm to Schumann on the two occasions they met briefly and had a generally low opinion of his music.) Consequently, the works for solo piano were rarely performed in public during Schumann’s lifetime, although Liszt performed selections from Carnaval in Leipzig in March 1840, omitting certain movements with Schumann’s consent. Six months after Schumann’s death, Liszt later wrote that Carnaval was a work “that will assume its natural place in the public eye alongside Beethoven’s Diabelli Variations, which in my opinion it even surpasses in melodic invention and conciseness”.

Sphinxs consists of three sections, each consisting of one bar on a single staff in bass (F) clef, with no key, tempo, or dynamic indications. The notes are written as breves . The pitches given are the notes E♭C B A (SCHA) and A♭C B (AsCH) and A E♭C B (ASCH). Many pianists and editors, including Clara Schumann, advocate for omitting the Sphinxs in performance.

These are musical cryptograms , as follows:

• A, E♭, C, B – German: A–Es–C–H (the Es is pronounced as a word for the letter S)
• A♭, C, B – German: As–C–H
• E♭, C, B, A – German: as Es–C–H–A

The first two spell the German name for the town of Asch (now As in the Czech Republic), in which Schumann’s then fiancée, Ernestine von Fricken, was born.The sequence of letters also appears in the German word Fasching, meaning carnival. In addition, Asch is German for “Ash”, as in Ash Wednesday , the first day of Lent. Lastly, it encodes a version of the composer’s name, Robert Alexander Schumann. The third series, S–C–H–A, encodes the composer’s name again with the musical letters appearing in Schumann, in their correct order.