Classical Piano 2024

Composers: Albinoni, Tomaso (1671-1751); Bach, Johann Sebastian (1685-1750); Beethoven, Ludwig van (1770-1827); Brahms, Johannes (1833-97); Dukas, Paul (1865-1935); Gounod, Charles François (1818-93); Grieg, Edvard Hagerup (1843-1907); Handel, George Frideric (1685-1759); Mendelssohn, Felix (1809-47); Mozart, Wolfgang Amadeus (1756-91); Pachelbel, Johann (1653-1706); Rimsky Korsakov, Nikolay Andreyevich (1844-1908); Saint-Saëns, Charles Camille (1835-1921); Smetana, Bedrich (1824-84); Tchaikovsky, Piotr Ilyich (1840-93); Vivaldi, Antonio (1678-1741); Wagner, Richard (1813-83).

It must have been some seven years ago that I first discovered the music of Erich Wolfgang Korngold (1857-1957) and I remember feeling absolutely overjoyed. I immediately felt an incredible connection to his music and it was honestly a sensation that I could only remember from discovering classical music in my early childhood. It more or less shocked me though that this had happened through my interest in symphonic film music rather than the classical music world that surrounded me, where at the time he seemed to be hardly known.

Music is a universal language. It transcends linguistic and (most) cultural borders. Yet it is not nationless or without idiosyncrasies determined by place and local culture. There are, therefore, instruments which are more closely associated with a particular place than with another. This does not apply just to folk instruments (as the Scottish bagpipes, the Spanish guitar, or the Russian balalaika, to name but few) but also to instruments which are fully part of the “international” musical panorama and of the Classical Symphony Orchestra. Thus, the violin is by no means a “local” instrument; yet, there is a closeness between Hungarian/gipsy music and the violin which is lacking elsewhere. Similarly, the flute is as universal an instrument as there can be (it is probably the most common instrument in all epochs and cultures), but it has a privileged relationship with France.

The idea behind Carmen Stefanescu's latest double album starts with the piano. The Voice of Piano focuses primarily on the vocal qualities of the instrument. But it is also about the diverse interrelationships between the singing voice, between orchestral or piano song and the piano. This new double CD contains the artist's favorite pieces, almost exclusively song transcriptions of works by composers such as Mahler, Rachmaninoff, Sibelius and Strauss.

Out of curiosity, we asked the 'artificial intelligence' to write a press release for the latest new release. Question for the AI: Please write a press release for a CD with the complete works for violin and piano by Gabriel Fauré in a length of approx. 75 words. Matthias Lingenfelder, violin and Peter Orth, piano.

Pianist extraordinaire Anthony De Mare’s landmark commissioning project, Liaisons: Re-Imagining Sondheim from the Piano, reaches Volume II with a diverse range of 14 tracks by a roll call of contemporary composers from the worlds of classical, jazz, film, indie, pop and musical theatre, including Jon Batiste, Stephen Hough, Meredith Monk, Max Richter, Conrad Tao, with the soloist himself contributing the title track “All Things Bright and Beautiful”.

Nanako Sugiura (Piano) began playing the piano at age 5. Graduated from Kyoritsu Women's University, Faculty of Literature and Arts, Japanese Literature Course. Completed the master's course at Musashino Academia Musicae. After completing her studies, she served as an accompaniment trainee at the same university. She has studied with Shoichi Yamada, Akiko Sakikawa, Mineko Tsuchiya, Takayoshi Wanami, and others. In addition to solo recitals, she also performs a lot of chamber music.In May 2018, she appeared and performed with the Czech Philharmonic Soloists at the 10th anniversary concert of their visit to Japan. Currently, she is making her commitment to Japanese works her life's work, and is involved in recording, premiering new works, and publishing works by Japanese composers.

The unusual combination of clarinet, viola and piano performs works by Paul Juon, Johan Amberg, Robert Schumann and Jean Francaix. Each movement in Robert Schumann's eponymous Marchenerzahlungen (Fairy Tales) has an almost narrative character and conjures up concrete scenes in the mind's eye. Although the movement designations here consist only of tempo or interpretation indications, the programmatic background of the respective pieces can hardly be ignored. The other three works for the same instrumentation on this album also have narrative structures.

Davell Crawford, the Piano Prince of New Orleans, brings the sophisticated and classy style of Roberta Flack to life on piano with a program of music made famous by the iconic singer.

Duos With Piano with pianist Alberto Rosado presents itself before us like a photograph, still in development, of a part of the vital outline of Jesús Torres. It shows us his essential characteristics, his concerns, and the solutions he has adopted throughout the more than twenty years covered by this volume (1997-2018). Along with Rosado’s duo partners on the album.