Piano Works 1936–2000 Josef Tal, Ofra Yitzhaki

For many centuries, Georgia has been a country in which different ethnicities and religions have lived side by side: Armenians, Azerbaijanis, Kurds, Jews, Christians and Muslims.

The entire Viola works from the composer Josef Tal, the outstanding Hindemith student and the founder of the studio of electronic music, one of the most important composers of Isrea.

Csaba Szabó (1936–2003) composed music in almost all genres: orchestral and vocal/choral-orchestral works, chamber music, songs, choral works, staged works, incidental musical for theatre and solos. From this important and varied oeuvre, this recording presents the complete works for piano solo of Csaba Szabó. His piano pieces were composed over a period of almost three decades, between 1955 and 1981, and it is striking to hear the extraordinary transformations in form, technique and richness of message that the composer’s style has undergone.

The eminent Russian pianist, pedagogue and composer, Samuel [Samuil] Feinberg, was born in Odessa and raised in Moscow. From an early age he exhibited an extraordinary talent on the piano. He enrolled in the Moscow Conservatory and studied piano with Alexander Goldenweiser. During his student years he took instruction in composition privately with Nikolai Zhilyayev.

Jose Iturbi’s father built and tuned pianos as a hobby so the young José had access to an instrument from a very early age. He was one of four children and his sister Amparo (1899–1969) also had a career as a pianist. At the age of eleven Iturbi was studying piano at the Valencia Conservatory with Joaquín Malats, a friend of Albéniz.

Goffredo Petrassi's interest in the piano goes back to his first approaches to music. He himself remembers the curiosity aroused by an old Viennese instrument dated 1826 - a contemporary therefore of Beethoven -which was in the house of an uncle at Zagarolo, the small town in the Roman countryside where the composer was born on 16 July 1904. After moving to Rome at the age of seven, Petrassi entered the Schola Cantorum of San Salvatore in Lauro.

Jose Iturbi’s father built and tuned pianos as a hobby so the young José had access to an instrument from a very early age. He was one of four children and his sister Amparo (1899–1969) also had a career as a pianist. At the age of eleven Iturbi was studying piano at the Valencia Conservatory with Joaquín Malats, a friend of Albéniz. The Spanish composer heard Iturbi and gave him part of his new work Iberia to play. When Iturbi was fifteen, the people of his home-town collected money to send him to study at the Paris Conservatoire with Victor Staub.

A versatile musician and music producer. Alessandro's preference for board instruments was clear when as a child he began to play as a self-taught pianist.

En 1994, dans le cadre de son contrat Sony, Cyprien Katsaris se rendait à Hamburg, dans la belle acoustique de la Friedrich-Ebert Halle, pour enregistrer plusieurs œuvres de J. S. Bach où se dévoile l’empreinte, forte, de la musique italienne de la fin du XVIIe et du début du XVIIIe, et ses violons concertants flamboyants et virtuoses.

Mikhail Krasnenker was born in Moscow on December 6, 2001. He started piano lessons at the age of 5. At 6, Mikhail was admitted at the Moscow Gnessin School of Music where he has been studying with Prof. Tatyana Zelikman till his graduation in 2018. Since 2018 Mikhail studies in Hochschule Luzern Musik with Professor Konstantin Lifschitz.