Goldberg

The Goldberg Variations stands as one of the greatest keyboard works ever written. Composed for a two-manual harpsichord, its universal musical language and distinct voicing has made it a popular subject for arrangement, including those for two pianos by Joseph Rheinberger, for woodwind quartet by Andrei Eshpai, for organ by Jean Guillou, and for solo guitar by József Eötvös, as well as the brilliantly re-imagined Gilded Goldbergs by Robin Holloway.

For the past two decades pianist Aaron Goldberg has crisscrossed the globe, spreading his music and absorbing local knowledge along the way. True to the jazz mentality, he learned to embrace serendipity as an artistic muse. Five years ago this month, in an historic chateau at the exact geographic center of France, Goldberg was reunited with an early influence. Soon a new project began to take shape. Goldberg’s latest recording, At The Edge of The World, documents this recent collaboration with drummer and percussionist Leon Parker, a brilliant innovator and performer, in a new trio along with the gifted bassist Matt Penman.

For the 15th anniversary of Ensemble Diderot, and after forays into concertos and chamber music using larger forces, Johannes Pramsohler and his colleagues go back to the roots with a recording of their core repertoire: trio sonatas. Highly inventive works by Bach pupils Johann Gottlieb Goldberg and Wilhelm Friedemann Bach make for a programme in which the Diderots show their art with their trademark stylish and agile playing.

In his arrangement of the Goldberg Variations, guitarist Walter Feybli has endeavored to stay as close as possible to the original and to combine the pieces harmoniously. He deliberately chose those variations whose character is reminiscent of suite movements and which sound as natural on the guitar as if they were played on the piano as originally intended.