Edna Stern’s latest release is a fascinating find. Beautifully performed, for sure, but those performances are led by an intriguing, impeccably realised idea. The pieces on this disc are well-loved and oft-recorded: the first four ‘Impromptus’ (D899) and the ‘Moments Musicaux’ (D780). But Stern, following the courage of her convictions, has arrived at a new…
Tag: piano music
Darkness and Light: Nightlight – Cordelia Williams, piano
Darkness and light pervade Cordelia Williams’ latest release, Nightlight, which explores the many facets of nighttime – its turmoil, terror and tenderness, and the longing for and consolation of light – through a programme of brooding, atmospheric and ultimately consoling music.
‘The Piano: A History in 100 Pieces’ – a must-read for pianophiles & music lovers
It was perhaps inevitable that pianist and writer Susan Tomes would turn her attention eventually to the extraordinarily broad repertoire of the piano – her instrument, and mine, and that of countless others, both professional and amateur players. While her previous books have been concerned with the myriad aspects of “being a pianist” – from…
Stealing & Re-imagining: ‘Landscapes’ by Doug Thomas
Most composers (and artists and writers too) steal from others. They learn their craft by copying; studying the works of others who’ve gone before them offers important insights into the nuts and bolts of the music (structure, harmony, texture etc) as well as the composer’s personal musical fingerprints.
Pigment of the imagination: Roger Eno and Brian Eno, ‘Mixing Colours (Expanded)’
Almost perfect lockdown listening, this record takes the state of ‘very little happening’ and creates something beautiful and resilient in its care and restraint. Eno-watchers might feel that I’ve taken an appropriately glacial length of time to write about this album, but all is not quite as it seems: this is the third ‘Mixing Colours’…
Intimate, personal and autobiographical: new releases of piano music by Schumann and Schubert
R. Schumann – Works for Piano / Joseph Tong This new release by British pianist Joseph Tong on the Quartz label contains some of Schumann’s most intimate and autobiographical music, notably the Fantasie in C, Op 17. Never one for disguising his emotions, Schumann described it as “perhaps the most impassioned music I have ever…
Variations on a traditional programme – Inon Barnatan at Wigmore Hall
George Frideric Handel – Chaconne in G major HWV435 Johann Sebastian Bach – Partita No.4 in D major BWV828, II. Allemande Jean-Philippe Rameau – Premier livre de pieces de clavecin, IV. Courante in A minor François Couperin – Second livre de pieces de clavecin, Ordre 12 No. 8 L’Atalante Maurice Ravel – Le tombeau…
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