Classical Music

Classical Music

Classical Music

Russian pianist and composer Valery Kuleshov’s limitless technique, palette of colors, sense of structure and range of sonorities beggar belief. His “Boris Godunov Suite” – transcribed after Mussorgsky’s opera – captures in pianism of nearly unparalleled invention and difficulty the work’s rich orchestral textures. The thrill and excitement of Mussorgsky’s “Night on Bald Mountain” is superbly maintained in Kuleshov’s awe-inspiring tour-de-force transcription. Tchaikovsky’s “Romeo and Juliet”, transcribed by Florian Noack, remains as fresh and colorful as the original.

Any new recording of Charles-Valentin Alkan is an event, which hopes to widen the public appreciation of this still unknown genius of the French Romantic period. After his unsuccessful efforts at a brilliant concert career, Alkan went into reclusion, concentrating on teaching and composing his totally unique oeuvre mainly written for piano solo. One of the greatest virtuosos of his time (even Franz Liszt was nervous to play in his presence) he wrote piano music of the most colossal proportions, scope and difficulty. This new recording by the young and extraordinarily gifted young Italian Vincenzo Maltempo brings together two of Alkan masterworks: The Grande Sonata "Les Quatre Ages" (in which Alkan musically describes the stages of a man's life, from exuberant youth to tragic old age), and the Symphonie pour piano solo, a dramatic four movement work in Classical/Romantic style. As an encore the fiendishly difficult Etude for two hands unisono, a pianistic tour de force.

This new recording contains a fine selection of piano sonatas by Muzio Clementi, from both his early and mature years. The Sonatas Op. 2 and 7 clearly show the striking originality and pianistic innovations of Clementi, which feature octaves, runs in thirds and elaborate arpeggios. The music’s “Empfindsamkeit” is expressed in both dark and passionate moods and light-hearted vitality. Clementi’s pianistic style paved the way for the great 19th century virtuosos and still proves a serious challenge for the professional pianists today. Korean pianist Ilia Kim was educated in Berlin, the Salzburg Mozarteum, Hochschule Hannover and the Imola Piano school in Italy, where she settled in 1998. She is an active concert pianist, having played at important festivals like Schleswig-Hollstein, Dubrovnik and the Tiroler Festspiele.

Janacek composed his piano music around the turn of the 19th and 20th centuries, before he found fame late in life with operas such as ‘Jenufa,’ ‘Kata Kabanova’ and ‘The Makropulos Case.’ Epigrammatic but obsessive, these intimate pieces speak of the composer’s passions and frustrations. But like his later works they are loaded with drama and big ideas. The first book in ‘On An Overgrown Path’ is notable for its poetic titles- such as ‘Our evenings,’ ‘They chattered like swallows,’ ‘Unutterable anguish’- which find expression in music of apparent folk-like innocence and sudden passions, which reach a powerful climax in the violent contrasts of the first book’s final piece, ‘The Barn-Owl has not flown away.’ This is music of heartbreak and desolation hardly less moving on its way than the great scenes of love and abandonment which Janacek composed for his operatic heroines. Stripped of such titles, the second book in ‘On An Overgrown Path’ is more elusive in meaning, swinging between a gentle, Czech translation of Debussy’s Impressionist tone-painting and darker, more sinister currents of expression that run raw and angry in the Sonata which Janacek wrote to commemorate the death of a young man at the hands of the police in Prague during political protests in the autumn of 1905. From seven years later, the four-movement cycle of Mists recovers some of the Romantic melancholy of ‘On an Overgrown Path,’ though its cathartic finale presents a stiff challenge to any pianist with its torrents of notes. As the recipient of a prestigious Borletti-Buitoni award, the Hungarian pianist Zoltan Fejervari is a solo, concerto and chamber-music pianist with several well-received recordings to his credit such as Liszt’s Malediction and an album of Mozart violin sonatas in partnership with Erno Kallai.

The Studien über die Etüden von F. Chopin have manifold purposes. Their aim is to develop the mechanical, technical and musical possibilities of piano playing, to expand the peculiarly adapted nature of the instrument to polyphonic, polyrhythmic and polydynamic work and to widen the range of its possibilities in tone coloring. The unusual mental and physical demands must invariably lead to a much higher proficiency in the command of the instrument, while the composer for the piano will find a number of suggestions regarding the treatment of the instrument. Special attention must be drawn to the fact, that owing to innumerable contrapuntal devices, which frequently compass almost the whole range of the keyboard, the fingering and pedaling are often of a revolutionary character. The Studien are to be considered in an equal degree suitable for concert purposes and private study. As the Chopin studies are, as compositions in étude form, universally acknowledged to be the highest attainment in the realm of beautiful piano music combined with indispensable mechanical and technical usefulness, the author thought it wisest to build upon their solid and invulnerable foundation, for the purpose of furthering the art of piano playing.

This new recording brings together three pianistic, stylistically united masterpieces: Schubert’s Wanderer Fantasy is based on a single motive, which is transformed in its four movements.Liszt adopted this “cyclic” principle in his B minor Piano Sonata, a half-hour structure of epic proportions and emotions.Janáček’s dramatic, truncated two-movement sonata also displays cyclic properties.The playing of young Russian pianist Philipp Kopachevsky (age 24) is of a rare maturity, understanding and imagination.He is a First-Prize winner of the Schubert Competition in Germany.

Piano Classics presents a full-blooded Russian program played by Alexander Ghindin, one of the foremost pianists in Russia today. Ghindin has been a winner in several international competitions including the Queen Elizabeth (2nd prize) and Cleveland Piano Competition (1st prize). Currently, he plays all over the world with distinguished orchestras and conductors. This recital includes Stravinsky's burlesque of the tragic puppet Petrouchka, a display of dazzling virtuosity and imagination, Rachmaninov's passionate and wistful Morceaux de fantaisie and the grand scope and bravura of Tchaikovsky's Piano Sonata.

German pianist Georg Friedrich Schenck, a pianist of colossal power and scope, gained an international reputation as teacher of an unorthodox "Creative Interpretation Technique," which resulted in stunning results (international prize winner Evgeny Bozhanov is a student of Schenck). Schenck (born in 1953) studied with Claudio Arrau and Andre Watts. He recorded the complete Beethoven piano sonatas and complete piano works of Brahms. His interpretation of Beethoven's notoriously difficult Hammerklavier sonata adheres to the original metronome marks of Beethoven, and is a revelation of Beethoven's ideas and spirit.

Earl Wild (1915-2010) was undoubtedly one of the great pianists of the 20th century. His immense repertoire, staggering virtuosity, warmth and charm warrant the epithet legendary. He was also a great improviser, frequently playing his own fantasies in recital. His creative legacy contains a wealth of transcriptions, fantasies, paraphrases, and original piano works. This CD, the first of a complete recording project of these works, features the young Italian pianist Giovanni Doria Miglietta.

The works on Sofya Gulyak's Piano Classics Johannes Brahms release span the composers' lifetime. The Handel Variations brim with energy, pianistic brilliance and youthful pathos, the two Rhapsodies Op. 79 are serious and dramatic, the Fantasien Op. 116 breathe the air of melancholy. Winner of the prestigious 2009 Leeds Competition (the first woman to do so in it's history), Ms. Gulyak has since performed at the world's most important venues. Her first CD, works of Rachmaninov, received international praise, including 5 Stars in French Diapason and "stunning debut album" from Gramophone.

Alexandre Alexandrovitch Kniazev has chosen the keyboard works of J. S. Bach as the focus of his new release with Piano Classics. Alexandre Kniazev is a Russian cellist and organist. He was named best musician of the year in Russia in 1999. Kniazev studied music at Moscow Conservatory, where he entered the cello class of Alexander Fedorchenko and in the organ class of G. Kozlova. After a solid musical education, he won first prizes in cello at the Vilnius competition, at that of G. Cassado, the International Chamber Music Competition in Trapini, and Pretoria. He also won the second prize of the International Tchaikovsky Competition of Moscow. He then performed all over the world and recorded many albums, two of which were awarded. In 2012 Alexander Kniazev headed the organ section of jury of the I All-Russian Music Competition in Kaliningrad. As an organist, Alexander Kniazev has given many highly acclaimed concerts both in Russia and abroad, performing recitals as well as works for organ and orchestra. He has frequently performed with French organist Jean Guillou in addition to recording his Fantaisie concertante for cello and organ, which was dedicated to Alexander Kniazev.

This new recording features two lesser known piano masterworks by the young Schumann: the F minor Piano Sonata, in which the classical sonata form is infused with Schumann’s unique romantic outpourings, and the Humoreske, the last of his piano cycles in which his alter egos Florestan and Eusebius make their presence. + Young Italian pianist Vincenzo Maltempo attracted worldwide attention with his three-volume recording of piano works by Alkan, collecting numerous 5 star reviews in the musical press: Guardian (“exhilarating, a real revelation!”), Diapason, Gramophone and Piano News.