Turkish pianist known for vast solo recordings and complete cycles; released extensively on her own Idil Biret Archive label. Repertoire spans Bach, Beethoven, Schubert, Liszt, and Saint-Saëns.
Rachmaninoff: Piano Concerto No. 3 & Rhapsody on a Theme of
Idil Biret Archive
CD
$19.99Jun 05, 2026
On 22 November 1963 at Idil Biret's US debut with the Boston Symphony Orchestra conducted by Erich Leinsdorf she played Rachmaninoff's 3rd Concerto. The concert was scheduled for 2.00pm. The tragic death of President Kennedy was announced during the concert. Despite the electrified atmosphere which can be sensed in the recording, the audience, many in tears, then heard a stunning performance of the concerto which was broadcast live to the nation from Boston and rebroadcast the next day from New York - "There was a buoyant quality to Idil Biret's playing, a great warmth of tone was in no way dispelled by her technical skill... she gave us power without a bang, emotion without a sentimental tear. There is no question that Miss Biret is one of the most extraordinary musicians and many of her listeners testified to her artistry by giving her a standing ovation."
The greater part of Chopin's music was written for his own instrument, the piano. At first it seemed that works for piano and orchestra would be a necessary part of his stock-in-trade, but the position he found for himself in Paris enabled him to write principally for the piano alone, in a characteristic idiom that derives some inspiration from contemporary Italian opera, much from the music of Poland, and still more from his own adventurous approach to harmony and his own sheer technical ability as a player. Of the forms that Chopin used, the romantic Impromptu offered a particular freedom, with it's suggestion of music dashed off in some fine, careless rapture. His Fantaisie-Impromptu was written in 1835, but published posthumously. It was followed by three further works under the same generic title. The Mazurka, a Polish dance, provided Chopin with a basic rhythmic pattern, his first attempt made in childhood at the age of ten and his last in the year of his death. The form became one with which he was particularly closely associated, an expression of his patriotism. Writers had started to show an interest in the traditional ballad with the publication by Bishop Percy of his Reliques of Ancient English Poetry, which first appeared in the 1760s. The work of Sir Walter Scott as a collector and as a poet added to the enthusiasm. In Germany further interest was shown, with the publication of translations of ballads and the creation of new ones, first by Bürger and then by Goethe and Schiller. This literary form, reflected in ballad settings by Schubert, Loewe and others, led Chopin to a purely instrumental form, based, it has been suggested, on poems by Mickiewicz, contemporary ballads of Polish patriotic purport. The first of Chopin's four Ballades implies a narrative content, opening with the words of the story-teller and proceeding to events of greater excitement. Chopin completed his collection of Preludes in 1839, when he published a set of 24, using all major and minor keys. A number of the Preludes were written during his winter in Mallorca with George Sand and her two children. They had arrived on the island in November, their appearance arousing some suspicions in the minds of local people. Deterioration in the weather aggravated the weakness of Chopin's health and doctors diagnosed tuberculosis. Forced to leave their lodgings and to pay for their fumigation, the party moved to rooms in the deserted monastery at Valldemosa, where George Sand continued to nurse him, in spite of considerable local hostility towards this woman who smoked cigars, the two long-haired boys and a girl who dressed as a man. It was with some relief that they left Mallorca in February, happy to return to France. It was in these circumstances, graphically described by George Sand in her Hiver à Majorque, that the Preludes were completed and revised, before being dispatched to Camille Pleyel for publication, each one a musical vignette. The second of Chopin's three sonatas includes, as a slow movement, his famous Funeral March, written in 1837, while the second of his four scherzos, the Scherzo in B flat minor, was written in the same key and same year. Originally a musical joke, with Beethoven a relatively jocular symphonic movement that replaced the traditional minuet as a bridge between a slow movement and a final symphonic rondo, the scherzo, for Chopin, became an extended and independent composition, here passionate in it's content. His single Berceuse, completed in 1844, makes much more than might be expected from the lullaby of the title. The Polish dance, the Polonaise, found it's way from village to ball-room and thence abroad. In Paris in 1830 Poland was in the news, with the attempted rising against Russia and it's suppression, and things Polish enjoyed considerable popularity, a fact from which Chopin benefited on his arrival in the city. As with other relatively trivial dance forms, he was able to raise the Polonaise to a new level, imparting a degree of complexity and a degree of feeling that had not always been present in the work of his elders in Warsaw. Chopin's first attempts at the form were at the age of seven and his last in 1846, three years before his death, and there is a clear element of patriotism about the two Polonaises included in the present collection, the Military and the Heroic.
This newest release from the Naxos Idil Biret archive features the works of Claude Debussy. "For well versed insiders of music, Idil Biret is since years a trusted, respected and beloved artist... The discipline of her powerful grasp and approach of the music has led, especially for works of our century, to a stylistic congruence between the written score and the interpretation...(that) makes us all aware of an outstanding artistic potency of the highest standards of excellence!" (DIE WELT, Germany 1979) "Idil Biret takes the opening movement of Debussy's Children's Corner very briskly and impetuously, but the performance then settles down and is sensitive and well characterized, especially the closing Golliwog's Cakewalk. Good recording and recommendable couplings too." (PENGUIN GUIDE, England 2009) "There is no question whatever that Biret's reading of the Ravel Gaspard de la nuit takes it's place among the most delicately wrought Ravel interpretations by any of the many great pianists renowned for their performances of French piano music." (SOHO WEEKLY NEWS, USA 1977)
Although the late piano trios by Haydn are no less important than the quartets or the symphonies, they still tend to be overlooked; which makes this recording so important, particularly as the Abegg Trio phrases the music so intelligently, presents the compositional factor so meaningfully, and at the same time underlines the remarkable colorfulness of this work, which is reflected in extraordinary switches of key. (nmz) 4009850008903 TCET89.2 19542485 .00 23.99 .22 TACET RECORDS COMPACT DISCS CLASSICAL CHAMBER MUSIC & RECITALS 05/01/1999 08/31/2026 https://media.aent-m.com/graphics/items/sdimages/a/500/0/2/2/7/1997220.jpg 5 1 N
CRUMB / INTERNATIONAL CONTEMPORARY ENSEMBLE COMPLETE GEORGE CRUMB EDITION 12 090404926129 BRI9261.2 13950026 .00 18.99 .25 BRIDGE COMPACT DISCS CLASSICAL CHAMBER MUSIC & RECITALS 09/09/2008 https://mediacdn.aent-m.com/prod-img/500/66/1276966-2552981.jpg 1 1 N
PINK TURTLE POP IN SWING 3448960250320 FRAS503.2 14908286 .00 20.99 .25 FREMEAUX & ASSOC. FR COMPACT DISCS POP JAZZ 01/12/2010 https://media.aent-m.com/graphics/items/sdimages/a/500/1/5/6/9/1389651.jpg 2 1 N
KRENEK / KORZHEV PIANO SONATAS NOS. 2 & 4 811691011295 PNX129.2 13853112 .00 18.99 .21 PHOENIX EDITION COMPACT DISCS CLASSICAL CHAMBER MUSIC & RECITALS 08/26/2008 https://media.aent-m.com/graphics/items/sdimages/a/500/0/4/4/2/1402440.jpg 14 1 N
LIEUWEN / LARSEN / ENHAKE ENSEMBLE / RYAN GULFSTREAM: AMERICAN CHAMBER MUSIC Libby Larsen' Rodeo Queen of Heaven takes it's inspiration from religious iconography given a contemporary twist-a painting of a Madonna with gun-in a rhythmically vivacious tableau. Peter Lieuwen presents an aural portrait of the Gulfstream. 636943969229 NAAC8559692.2 16182592 .00 19.99 .20 NAXOS AMERICAN COMPACT DISCS CLASSICAL ORCHESTRAL & SYMPHONIC 11/15/2011 https://media.aent-m.com/graphics/items/sdimages/c/500/7/3/2/8/1908237.jpg 3 1 N
GREIG COMP ORCH WORKS Grieg: Complete Orchestral Works - This boxed set of Grieg's complete orchestral works is a celebration of the composer's rich and multifaceted aesthetic. Grieg was an idealistic humanist whose music and writings underlined a harmony between humans and nature. The sense of nostalgia and 'postcard lyricism' often associated with him belies the wild energy also present in his music-it's primeval force, pessimistic emotions and tempestuous Romanticism. Thanks to Bjarte Engeset's carefully researched and widely admired performances, Grieg's complex musical universe can here be appreciated in full. 747313801534 NXS508015.2 26374741 .00 56.99 .82 NAXOS COMPACT DISCS CLASSICAL ORCHESTRAL & SYMPHONIC 05/27/2014 https://media.aent-m.com/graphics/items/sdimages/c/500/9/3/2/8/1908239.jpg 12 8 Y
LISZT / BIRET 12 GRANDES ETUDES S 138: SOLO EDITION 3 Idil Biret' new Liszt album prompts a reappraisal of her extraordinary talent... in her Liszt Sonata... you will hear playing of a formidable power and assurance... There is no mistaking her lightning reflexes in the second of the Paganini Etudes and her vi.
Perfect Piano: Best Loved Classical Piano Music / Various
Naxos
CD
$19.99Feb 28, 2020
This new release is part of the Best Loved series, covering a substantial selection of iconic and entertaining works from the Naxos catalogue. This series will be accompanied by supplementary online playlists. Includes Beethoven’s Für Elise, Rachmaninov’s Prelude in C sharp minor, and works by John Field and Schumann, taken from top recordings such as Idil Biret’s acclaimed Chopin edition, Jeno Jandó’s Schubert Impromptus (8.550260), and Boris Giltburg’s Beethoven Sonatas (8.573400).
In November 1949, at the age of eight, Idil Biret entered the studios of ORTF (Radiodiffusion Television Francaise) in Paris and made her first recordings; these were works by Couperin, Bach, Beethoven and Debussy. In the following decades she made nearly 100 LPs and CDs, released on ten record labels (Pretoria, Vega, Decca, Atlantic/Finnadar, Pantheon, EMI, Naxos, Marco Polo, Alpha, BMP) and many recordings for radio and television stations around the world. These included the complete piano works of Brahms, Chopin and Rachmaninov as well as the Sonatas of Boulez and the Etudes of Ligeti. The Idil Biret Archive (IBA) is now bringing together her past and present recording; as the copyrights are obtained, old recordings no longer available commercially are being released together with her new recordings. The transcriptions by Liszt of Beethoven's Symphonies, originally recorded for EMI, and the newly recorded 32 Sonatas and all the Piano Concertos of Beethoven were released by IBA and also made available in a box set. All the Piano Concertos of Liszt, Tchaikovsky, Schumann and Grieg and the nine LPs recorded for Atlantic/Finnadar in New York which include works by Boulez, Webern, Berg, Ravel and Stravinsky were also released. Among the recent new releases are Liszt's Etudes and the piano transcription of Berlioz's Harold en Italie, Schumann's Carnaval, Fantasie and other works, all five Piano Concertos of Hindemith and, in the Archive Edition, the early LPs made in France for Pretoria (Schumann, Brahms), Vega (Bartok, Prokofiev, Brahms, Beethoven) and Decca (Rachmaninov). IBA is distributed worldwide by Naxos.
Fryderyk Chopin (1810-1849) was born in the village of Zelazowa Wola in Mazovia, the son of a French father and a Polish mother. This mixed heritage would weave like a double helix through Chopin's career as a composer-pianist. Following studies at Warsaw Conservatory (1826-29) and 've given concerts in Warsaw and Vienna (1829-30), Chopin settled in Paris in 1831. His most famous romantic liaison was with Aurore Dude Vant (aka novelist George Sand), the years 1838- 1847 coinciding with his most productive period. Their relationship ended shortly after, Chopin visited Britain in 1848, where his already precarious health Deteriorated. Almost 3,000 people attended his funeral the following year at the Madelaine in Paris though he Remained a Polish patriot Throughout his short life, he Became a French citizen. Although educated in the tradition of Beethoven, Haydn, Mozart and Clementi, and a great admirer of Bach, his music includes works based on both French and Polish models, as well as some innovations. Among the former May be Counted his piano sonatas; Bach's counterpoint found it's way (albeit metamorphosed) into his own multilayered music; his many Viennese Waltzes are more Parisian than; Polonaises and Mazurkas raised his thesis Polish dance forms to Unprecedented Heights or artistic achievement. Similarly, he transformed, the Nocturne, Initially popularized by the Irish-born Russian-based John Field, into a form much more Closely associated with himself. His Ballades, Preludes and Etudes were path-breaking and immensely influential. Two piano concertos, some songs and chamber works aside, he composed Exclusively for the solo piano and preferred to perform at salons privately rather than in public concerts.
HINDEMITH Konzertmusik for Piano, Brass, and Two Harps, op. 49. The Four Temperaments. Piano Music with Orchestra (for Piano Left Hand), op. 29. Kammermusik No. 2 for Piano, Quartet, and Brass, op. 36/1. Piano Concerto • Idil Biret (pn); Toshiyuki Shimada, cond; Yale SO • NAXOS 8.573201-02 (2 CDs: 136:15)
Idil Biret will be no stranger to readers; as one of Naxos’s most reliable house artists, she has recorded vast amounts of the piano repertoire for the label. The works on this two-CD set, however, may not be as familiar as she is. With the exception of The Four Temperaments, which has gained somewhat of a foothold on record and as a concert work—Hindemith was originally commissioned by George Balanchine in 1940 to produce a score for a ballet—the other four works on these discs may be new to all but those who are Hindemith devotees.
The title of the album, The Complete Piano Concertos, stretches the definition a bit of what constitutes a concerto, but Hindemith’s habit of writing for unusual combinations of instruments and setting them in somewhat unorthodox forms can make classifying his works subject to interpretation.
The program opens with the Konzertmusik for Piano, Brass, and Two Harps, commissioned by Elizabeth Coolidge Sprague and composed in 1930. The brass instruments called for in the “Brass” of the work’s title are four horns, three trumpets, two trombones, and tuba. In four movements, the piece is best described as being in Hindemith’s neobaroque style.
The Theme with Four Variations for Piano and Strings, commonly referred to as just The Four Temperaments, though originally intended to be choreographed for a ballet, works well as a concert piece because essentially it can be seen as a four-movement symphony with an introduction. The introduction in this case is the statement of the theme. Four variations (movements) follow, each representing one of the four temperaments or medieval humors—black bile for the melancholic, blood for the sanguine, phlegm for the phlegmatic, and yellow bile for the choleric. The bodily fluids are enough to conjure a scene from the embalming room in a mortuary, but Hindemith’s music is full of life and gorgeous sonorities.
As mentioned above, this is the main work in which Biret and the Yale Symphony Orchestra’s strings run into some significant competition in the numbers game. Two versions that have been long on my shelf are those by Carol Rosenberger with the strings of the Royal Philharmonic on Delos and Howard Shelley with the strings of BBC Philharmonic on Chandos. Biret on the present recording acquits herself well in the solo piano part, but the string players of the Yale orchestra, an ensemble made up of the university’s undergraduate students don’t play with quite the coordination and richness of tone as do their professional counterparts across the Pond.
Hindemith, like Ravel, was commissioned to write a piano work for the left hand by Paul Wittgenstein, the pianist who lost his right arm in the First World War. Quite a few other composers were enlisted in the enterprise as well, including Britten, Kornold, Prokofiev, and Richard Strauss. They all complied, but Wittgenstein ended up not performing all the works he solicited. Hindemith’s contribution was Piano Music with Orchestra (for Piano Left Hand) composed in 1923. It has gained nowhere near the exposure of Ravel’s Concerto for the Left Hand; in fact, at the moment ArkivMusic lists only one other recording besides this one, a 2008 live performance by Leon Fleisher with the Curtis Symphony Orchestra led by Christoph Eschenbach.
The Hindemith is a captivating score with a perky, jazzy first movement; a catchy, ostinato-driven second movement that periodically lapses into march-like, military fanfares; a haunting third movement in which the piano and a solo English horn (then later a solo flute) engage in a long, slow, lonely dance; and a Finale that once again is in the composer’s best neobaroque style.
The Kammermusik No. 2, for Piano, Quartet, and Brass, is the second in a series of seven Kammermusik works Hindemith promised to deliver to conductor Hermann Scherchen, who took an interest in promoting new music by contemporary composers of the period. It’s a bit difficult to categorize these works, for no two of them are scored for the same combination of instruments, but all of them feature a solo instrument and a varied ensemble of 11 or more players. Because the solo instrument—whether piano, cello, violin, viola, viola d’amore, or organ—is treated as it would be in a concerto, the seven works are loosely classified as chamber concertos, but the number of instruments in the orchestra pushes the definition of “chamber.” To confuse matters further, sandwiched in between the first and third of these seven Kammermusik scores, is a lone stray, if you will, that goes by the title, Kleine Kammermusik, so-called because it is scored for wind quintet with no soloist; yet it’s sometimes lumped together with its larger-scaled Kammermusik cousins.
All together then there are eight of these works, but the only recorded version I’m aware of that includes the whole shebang—and it’s an outstanding one—is the two-disc set by Riccardo Chailly leading members of the Royal Concertgebouw on Decca. If one or more readers are wondering why I’m omitting the equally excellent set by Claudio Abbado with members of the Berlin Philharmonic on EMI, it’s because that set, as well as all the others listed, include only the seven Kammermusik entries. Abbado fills out his set leading violist Tabea Zimmermann in an incomparably beautiful performance of Hindemith’s Der Schwanendreher. But Chailly’s set, as far as I know, is unique in being the only one to include the lone Kleine Kammermusik score for wind quintet.
Perhaps it’s the other surveys that make more sense, because the Kleine Kammermusik is really a fish out of water that doesn’t go with the seven Kammermusik works. Still, it’s too delightful a piece to be without, and stand-alone recordings of it are mostly included on programs of wind quintet works by a mix of composers, though one, on Sony, does offer an all-Hindemith program of the composer’s other wind works.
Most of the Kammermusik scores fall into Hindemith’s neobaroque style, for which reason they have sometimes been branded the “Brandenburgs of the 20th century.” I wouldn’t push that analogy too far, though, for it may be apt to the extent that the writing is contrapuntal in nature and that each concerto is scored for a different combination of instruments, but in harmonic, rhythmic, and textural makeup the music is very Modernistic. This is not the type of neobaroque treatment one hears in a work like Stravinsky’s Pulcinella, which really is based on late Baroque and very early Classical models.
Finally, we come to Hindemith’s formally titled Piano Concerto of 1945, premiered by George Szell, the Cleveland Orchestra, and the pianist for whom the piece was written, Jesús Maria Sanromá. Hindemith composed the Concerto while vacationing in Maine and Connecticut. Of the five works on the disc, this is the latest written and, frankly, if you’re not already familiar with the piece, it’s the one that’s likely to take three or four hearings before you warm to it. It’s not that its musical language is any more Modernistic or difficult to comprehend than what has gone before; rather, it’s that the work seems to proceed episodically, with sections following each other that don’t seem, on the surface at least, to relate. Thus, the logic of the score is elusive.
Current competition is slim, and what there is of it is mostly not very current, with a 1948 performance led by Sergiu Celibidache and a First Edition recording by the Louisville Orchestra led by Lawrence Leighton Smith. The most recent version—aside from the one at hand—is by Werner Andreas Albert leading the Frankfurt Radio Symphony Orchestra on CPO, and even that one dates back more than a decade.
For Hindemith fans, this new Naxos collection of the composer’s complete works featuring a solo piano in combination with various instrumental ensembles will make an excellent addition to your collection, even if you already have some of these works on other recordings. For Hindemith novices and the curious, at Naxos’s bargain prices, this new two-disc set offers much very attractive and enjoyable music in excellent performances, and it may just inspire you to explore more of Hindemith’s output. Recommended.
In November 1949, at the age of eight, Idil Biret entered the studios of ORTF (Radiodiffusion Television Francaise) in Paris and made her first recordings; these were works by Couperin, Bach, Beethoven and Debussy. In the following decades she made nearly 100 LPs and CDs, released on ten record labels (Pretoria, Vega, Decca, Atlantic/Finnadar, Pantheon, EMI, Naxos, Marco Polo, Alpha, BMP) and many recordings for radio and television stations around the world. These included the complete piano works of Brahms, Chopin and Rachmaninov as well as the Sonatas of Boulez and the Etudes of Ligeti. The Idil Biret Archive (IBA) is now bringing together her past and present recording; as the copyrights are obtained, old recordings no longer available commercially are being released together with her new recordings. The transcriptions by Liszt of Beethoven's Symphonies, originally recorded for EMI, and the newly recorded 32 Sonatas and all the Piano Concertos of Beethoven were released by IBA and also made available in a box set. All the Piano Concertos of Liszt, Tchaikovsky, Schumann and Grieg and the nine LPs recorded for Atlantic/Finnadar in New York which include works by Boulez, Webern, Berg, Ravel and Stravinsky were also released. The present album features Beethoven’s Piano Sonatas Pathetique, Moonlight, Waldstein, and Appassionata. IBA is distributed worldwide by Naxos.
In November 1949, at the age of eight, Idil Biret entered the studios of ORTF (Radiodiffusion Television Francaise) in Paris and made her first recordings; these were works by Couperin, Bach, Beethoven and Debussy. In the following decades she made nearly 100 LPs and CDs, released on ten record labels (Pretoria, Vega, Decca, Atlantic/Finnadar, Pantheon, EMI, Naxos, Marco Polo, Alpha, BMP) and many recordings for radio and television stations around the world. These included the complete piano works of Brahms, Chopin and Rachmaninov as well as the Sonatas of Boulez and the Etudes of Ligeti. The Idil Biret Archive (IBA) is now bringing together her past and present recording; as the copyrights are obtained, old recordings no longer available commercially are being released together with her new recordings. The transcriptions by Liszt of Beethoven's Symphonies, originally recorded for EMI, and the newly recorded 32 Sonatas and all the Piano Concertos of Beethoven were released by IBA and also made available in a box set. All the Piano Concertos of Liszt, Tchaikovsky, Schumann and Grieg and the nine LPs recorded for Atlantic/Finnadar in New York which include works by Boulez, Webern, Berg, Ravel and Stravinsky were also released. The present album is a showcase of Turkish Piano Music and is made up of recordings made between 1958 and 2021. IBA is distributed worldwide by Naxos.
J.S. Bach: The Well-Tempered Klavier - 48 Preludes and Fugue
Idil Biret Archive
CD
$45.99Apr 04, 2025
The centerpiece of the Bach collection is a 2015 recording of The Well-Tempered Clavier, the so- called old testament of piano music, a series of 48 preludes and fugues in all of the piano's possible keys. A look at that monumental collection's recorded history could serve as a compendium of piano performance styles through the last 120 years. Unsurprisingly, Biret conforms to none, and perhaps the best way to describe her interpretations is orchestral. As the historically informed Baroque practitioners prescribe, each prelude and fugue certainly has a distinct character, but those long lines emerge with the definition of strings, brass or winds, lush and strident by turn. Trills are mellow and exquisitely shaped, and a wealth of detail is present but never exaggerated. Biret's Bach is a cliff wall to be scaled, a peak to be reached and an aspiration to be achieved.
Beethoven: Symphony No. 9 (200th Anniversary, transcribed by
Idil Biret Archive
Vinyl
$74.99Jan 03, 2025
During the 200th anniversary of the first performance of Beethoven's 9th Symphony, in 2024, IBA is releasing a commemorative limited edition on LP, Idil Biret's performance of the symphony as transcribed for piano by Franz Liszt, originally recorded for EMI and published in a box set of 6LPs with all nine symphonies in 1986. The Choral Fantasy for Piano, Orchestra and Chorus, considered a precursor to the 9th Symphony, is also included in the set.
With this LP, IBA is beginning to release a new series of live concert recordings from the immense sound/video archive of Idil Biret from the 1950s to 2020. On the first LP, Schumann's Fantasie Op. 17 from the New York concert at Alice Tully Hall in 1972 and Liszt's Sonata in B minor from the Paris concert at Salle Gaveau in 1978 are included. These two performances of the works were significant milestones in Biret's concert career, opening up to her the stages of the Soviet Union and East Germany.
With Pierre Boulez's 2nd Piano Sonata Idil Biret not only makes her American recording debut, but also presents the first U.S. recording of this important contemporary work. Composed in 1948, this sonata occupies a position that exerted a causative influence upon Boulez's subsequent music. It's experimental and ground-breaking nature may be better understood if one regards it as having grown out of a response to Webern's Variations (1936), the companion piece on this album. The rigid, geometric patterns of Webern's work, the classical purity of it's encompassing organization, seems to have served as a base of departure for Boulez's broadened structures that are equally rigid but incomparably more complex. It is this very complexity that conceals the strict framework of the entire composition and projects it as the product of an ardent improvisatory impetus. It demands from it's interpreter a similar approach, along with technical prowess and intellectual control of the highest order. It was only a matter of course that this work, together with influences emanating from other sources (chiefly John Cage), should lead the path not only to open-form and aleatory compositions, including Boulez's own 3rd Piano Sonata, but also, through it's new pianistic language, urge the development of a whole new generation of virtuoso pianists. (Ilhan Mimaroglu, 1973)
After listening for a while (to orchestral music on the radio) Idil would detect the main melody and then play it on the piano with one finger. Afterwards, when she reached the age of four, she would play these with two hands and with the correct harmony. Bach preludes and fugues from the Well Tempered Clavier, for example, which even the talented musicians took considerable time to study and memorise, were mastered by Idil in only a few days after listening once or twice, after which she would play these without a single wrong note. (Leman Biret, 1988)
Bach published during his lifetime four volumes of keyboard pieces under the title Clavierubung which began with a set of six Partitas, published between 1726 and 1731. The first of the set was the Partita No. 1 in B flat major. The Chromatic Fantasia and Fugue in D minor, was apparently written during Bach's time at Cothen, probably about 1720, and revised in Leipzig about 1730. The six English Suites, the 3rd being included here, have nothing particularly English about them, except their title. They were written perhaps in Weimar in about 1715 or possibly during Bach's period at Cothen. Bach brought together a set of five French Suites, of which the 5th is Biret's favourite, later augmented to six and forming part of the Clavierbuchlein for Anna Magdalena, his second wife. The Italian Concerto in F major was published in 1735 in the second volume of the Clavierubungen, with the original title Concerto nach Italienischen Gusto. It reflects the style of the Venetian solo concertos by Vivaldi.
The Schwetzingen Festival concerts were dedicated to Chopin in 1999 on the 150th anniversary of his death. Four pianists were invited to the event. Three of them, Lilya Zilberstein, Anatole Ugorski and Andrei Gavrilov were 'stars' of Deutsche Grammophon. The fourth was Idil Biret who had not attained 'star' status as it was only available to those with contracts with the so-called "major" record labels. But, she had been the first pianist ever to record the complete works of Chopin for solo piano and with piano and orchestra for Naxos, received a Grand Prix du Disque Frederic Chopin in Warsaw in 1995 for this and was to be decorated with one of the highest orders of Poland by President Kaczynsky in 2007. Idil Biret did something no other pianist could do. Dr. Peter Stieber wrote: "Your own Chopin evening was then the breath-taking testimony of a great artist. We all could experience together how in your hands the wonderful music of Chopin begun truly to blossom."
J.S. Bach: Concertos for 1, 2, 3, 4 Keyboards - Idil Biret A
Idil Biret Archive
CD
$13.99$19.99Save 30%Feb 07, 2025
Idil Biret was introduced very early to the music of Bach. At the age of three she was trying to play from ear the preludes of Bach from the Well Tempered Clavier which her mother played on their upright piano and drawing his picture in her note book. In her memoires, Idil's mother Leman Biret writes: "After listening for a while to orchestral music on the radio Idil would detect the main melody and then play it on the piano with one finger. Afterwards, when she reached the age of four, she would play these on the piano with two hands and with the correct harmony. Bach preludes and fugues from the Well Tempered Clavier, for example, which even the talented musicians took considerable time to study and memorise, were mastered by Idil in only a few days after listening once or twice, after which she would play these without a single wrong note. "Then, at the age of four her teacher Mithat Fenmen played for Idil on an 78rpm record by Edwin Fischer the Prelude and Fugue in F minor from the Well Tempered Clavier Book II. She says that Bach's music has been a part of her life ever since that day. In 1946, at the age of five, she played the D Minor Piano Concerto of Bach with a string quartet at the Ankara Radio, a work that would be a staple of her concert programs from then on. "The remarkable evening began with D Minor Piano Concerto of J.S. Bach. The concerto required, from the very first measure, agile, precise dexterity from the pianist. Idil Biret took the challenge with a ravishing pulse which carried one away. How this artist combines the strict discipline of the score with the capacity to build sovereign forms is exemplary. Energetically, she drove the flanking Allegro movements forward and dwelled on the song like beauties of the Adagio with concentrated abandon." Dietrich Wolf DRESDNER NEUESTE NACHRICHTEN (Germany) 1996
![Beethoven: Sonatas: Pathetique - Moonlight - Waldstein - Appassionata / Biret [DVD]](http://arkivmusic.com/cdn/shop/files/3968245-2707210.jpg?v=1786712782&width=800)
![Beethoven: Sonatas: Pathetique - Moonlight - Waldstein - Appassionata / Biret [DVD]](http://arkivmusic.com/cdn/shop/files/2110687.20210503013814.jpg?v=1786712782&width=800)
![Beethoven: Sonatas: Pathetique - Moonlight - Waldstein - Appassionata / Biret [DVD]](http://arkivmusic.com/cdn/shop/files/3968245-2707210.jpg?v=1786712782&width=400)
