Johannes Brahms 24 Bit

The Ariel Quartet, distinguished by their virtuosic playing and impassioned interpretations, makes their debut recording pairing two giants of the string-quartet world, Bela Bartok and Johannes Brahms.

Zubin Mehta has had a decades-long artistic relationship and deep friendship with the Munich Philharmonic. Since conducting his first concert with the orchestra in 1987, he has been a regular guest there and in 2004 was named the orchestra's first and so far only "honorary conductor". Twenty years later, the orchestra celebrated this anniversary with the two piano concertos played by one of today's most celebrated and admired pianists: Yefim Bronfman.

With his First Concerto, the young Brahms set his own course in the wake of Beethoven and Schumann and at the same time poured forth his personal emotions in this work of impressive dimensions. Russian soloist, Alexander Melnikov, has chosen an instrument contemporary with the premiere, a magnificent Blüthner piano from 1859, a perfect match for the Sinfonieorchester Basel under it's British conductor Ivor Bolton. In addition to Brahms's Tragic Overture, the program also includes the much rarer Overture to Éliza, an opera by Cherubini, a composer whom Brahms greatly admired.

The Piano Concerto No. 2 in B♭ major, Op. 83, by Johannes Brahms is separated by a gap of 22 years from his first piano concerto. Brahms began work on the piece in 1878 and completed it in 1881 while in Pressbaum near Vienna. It took him three years to work on this concerto, which indicates that he was always self-critical. He wrote to Clara Schumann: "I want to tell you that I have written a very small piano concerto with a very small and pretty scherzo." Ironically, he was describing a huge piece. This concerto is dedicated to his teacher, Eduard Marxsen. The public premiere of the concerto was given in Budapest on 9 November 1881, with Brahms as soloist and the Budapest Philharmonic Orchestra, and was an immediate success. He proceeded to perform the piece in many cities across Europe.

Before the publication of his Hungarian Dances in their original version for piano four hands, Johannes Brahms was hardly known to the educated middle classes, but the works ensured that the composer became a household name.

Jos van Immerseel and Claire Chevallier have enjoyed a close collaboration for many years now. Like Jos van Immerseel, Claire Chevallier loves period pianos; like him, she is a researcher and possesses her own collection of keyboard instruments.

Before the publication of his Hungarian Dances in their original version for piano four hands, Johannes Brahms was hardly known to the educated middle classes, but the works ensured that the composer became a household name.

With his very own “mysterious seductive power and legendary elegance” (Le Monde), Claudio Abbado opened for the last time the LUCERNE FESTIVAL in the summer of 2013. Only a few months later, the world had to bid farewell to a monumental artist, humanist, great conductor and orchestra founder. Even in the concert itself, documented here, lived a moment of farewell, as the three great works performed tell of the transience of life. The centerpiece of the Eroica is the funeral march revealing “abysses of shattering dimension” - an “intense experience” (Neue Zürcher Zeitung). This record, the last audio-visual documentation of his work, captures once again the extraordinary atmosphere of “vibrant emotionality” that always emerged when Abbado created music with his “orchestra of friends”.

This album was born of my meeting with the pianist Denis Pascal, with whom a natural complicity quickly materialized. His collaboration became indispensable for taking up the two Brahms Sonatas opus 120, two masterpieces from the chamber music repertoire. The project also stems from my desire to forge a link between the past and the future at the turn of the century. Perhaps this is related to my experiences as solo clarinet of the Ensemble Intercontemporain.

This set of miniatures, sometimes called Seven Fantasies, was written by Brahms in 1892. Popular both with the listeners and performers, it is represented in our library with the recordings made by the young Johannes BrahmsEnglish pianists Sam Armstrong and Ashley Wass; Israel-born Benjamin Hochman and Rafael Skorka; the Russian pianist Yury Shadrin; and the Americans Christopher Atzinger and David Kaplan. Joseph DuBose takes an in-depth look into this piano masterpiece by the German composer.