Altmann Vietnam

Dussek led a restless life, travelling Europe as a keyboard virtuoso and settling in several European capitals, notably Paris and London, where he became a fashionable pianist and teacher. His close connection to piano manufacturer Broadwood resulted in important innovations, notably the extension of the keyboard to 6 octaves. Dussek’s style is rich, harmonically expressive and pianistically challenging, Classicism on the brink of Early Romanticism. Carl Friedrich Cramer writes in the “Magazin der Musik” in 1783: "These sonatas are the only ones of their kind. Rich in new thoughts and traces of the author's great musical genius. Very brilliant, and appropriate to the instrument. The accompaniment of the violin is so artificially combined with the piano part that both instruments are kept in constant attention; so that these sonatas require a violin player who is just as skilled as a piano player".

Over the course of his long and eventful career, Dussek composed 38 violin sonatas – or rather sonatas for the keyboard, accompanied by the violin – and the partnership of Julia Huber and Miriam Altmann is acquiring impressive credentials and critical praise as they gradually uncover them for the first time.