Latest news with #Beethoven
The Guardian
7 hours ago
- Entertainment
- The Guardian
‘It is impossible to recall him without smiling': Simon Rattle on Alfred Brendel
It's hard even to know where to start with Alfred: for any musician of my generation he was simply always there, the very definition of integrity and a kind of unique probing humour. I heard him first in Liverpool, playing Mozart's Piano Concerto No 22, K482, an unforgettable concert for an impressionable 14-year-old. I could never have imagined then that my first collaboration with him would be in the same city when I was 20. That Beethoven – his first piano concerto – began a long journey of learning and friendship over the subsequent decades. I cannot stress how much I learned from him, or how painfully obvious it was to me just how steep the climb was to be able to come anywhere near to being an adequate partner for him. I remember clearly the sense of being kindly but firmly stretched to beyond my level of musicianship. Immense freedom within a strict framework. I am profoundly grateful that he was willing to carry on pulling me upwards for nearly 40 years! I visited him often in his Hampstead home. I met his friend Isaiah Berlin there, terrifying enough on its own, and he said to me, 'you know, I don't think Alfred has ever had an unoriginal thought'. An astonishing but probably accurate observation from an intelligence that could recognise its equal. But often it was just the two of us, listening and discussing. He was happy to listen to interpretations I brought, as he was with surely countless other musicians, and my scores are full of his insights and recommendations. In the middle of one of my evidently lugubrious accounts of the Eroica symphony's funeral march, I noted his devastatingly honest comment 'Simon, have you never considered that there might be such a thing as active grief?' But often it was his wisdom about how to turn harmonic corners more eloquently. Difficult to achieve but vital for the music. Plus generous, challenging encouragement. Contemporary art, one of his quiet passions, politics, literature were also there in the mix. But it is his humour, an almost surreal amusement at the world around him, that remains the strongest memory, and the reason it is impossible to recall him without smiling, even in this time of sadness. The Alfred who, as a young man performing in Vienna, brought a tortoise on stage with him to walk around the concert hall floor, 'just because I like funny things.' This friendly devil would sometimes make an appearance. He loathed piped music: I remember him in one Birmingham restaurant spying a thin wire leading to what seemed to be an unstoppable sound system. 'I have just the thing' he said, producing a small pair of scissors from his jacket pocket. Seeing our astonishment as he quickly snipped through the wire, he said. 'Don't worry, they won't even notice until tomorrow and it may be weeks before they discover the wire!' As ever, unique and unexpected. And even the occasional sharp edges deeply lovable. What a privilege to have had him in our lives.
South China Morning Post
12 hours ago
- Entertainment
- South China Morning Post
Russian pianist Mikhail Pletnev plays subdued Beethoven and colourful Grieg in Hong Kong
The secret to a good story is, as they say, in the telling. Legendary Russian pianist Mikhail Pletnev wasted no time telling his tale to a packed audience in Hong Kong on June 17, launching into the Shigeru Kawai grand piano the very second he sat down. His recital was made up of two clearly opposed halves. The first saw his subdued yet thoughtful expressions of pathos and beauty in two of Beethoven's pillar sonatas, while a vivid depiction of Nordic nostalgia in a selection of Grieg's Lyric Pieces came after the intermission. The multifaceted musician-composer, whose distinguished international career began when he won first prize in the 1978 Tchaikovsky Competition, showed he had some real doozies up his sleeves despite exercising considerable emotional restraint in the first piece, Beethoven's Piano Sonata No. 8, the 'Pathétique'. Indeed, those expecting more outward expressions of the dramatic, agitated aspects of the music may have felt like they showed up at the wrong wedding. Expressions of pathos in the Grave introduction were more introspective in his hands, and any showy displays in the ensuing Allegro di molto con brio were equally shunned.
New Indian Express
a day ago
- Entertainment
- New Indian Express
Alfred Brendel, pianist renowned for refined playing of Beethoven, dies at age 94
LONDON: Alfred Brendel, a pianist and poet renowned for his refined playing of Beethoven over a six-decade career, died Tuesday at his home in London. He was 94. Brendel's death was announced by the public relations agency Bolton & Quinn. Born in what is now the Czech Republic, Brendel gave his first recital in Graz, Austria, in 1948 at age 17. His final concert was with the Vienna Philharmonic at the Musikverein on Dec. 18, 2008. 'I grew up in a family that was not musically inclined, not artistically inclined and not intellectual, so I had to find out a lot of things for myself,' he said in a 2012 interview for the Verbier Festival. 'I was a young person who in the early 20s did not think I have to achieve something within five years but I thought I would like to be able to do certain things when I'm 50. And when I was 50 I said to myself I have actually done most of the things I want to do.' Brendel also was praised for his interpretations of Mozart, Schubert, Liszt and Haydn. He recorded the 32 Beethoven piano sonatas three times, and he played them over a month at New York's Carnegie Hall in 1983, among 77 recitals in 11 cities during the 1982-83 season. He repeated the sonatas again at Carnegie over three seasons in the 1990s. 'With winks to the audience and demonstrative hand movements, he has a playful manner that offsets his serious, contemplative interpretations,' The Associated Press wrote during the 1990s cycle. Born on Jan. 5, 1931, in Wiesenberg, northern Moravia, Brendel studied piano in Zagreb, Yugoslavia, with Sofia Dezelic and then at the Graz Conservatory with Ludovika von Kaan. He also took composition lessons with Artur Michl. His studies were interrupted when he and his mother fled as the Russian army invaded during World War II.
Korea Herald
2 days ago
- Entertainment
- Korea Herald
Legends convene: Esa-Pekka Salonen, Krystian Zimerman, New York Philharmonic return to Seoul
NY Phil in Seoul after 11 years and Zimerman at the Arts Center after 22 years After 11 years, the New York Philharmonic returns to Seoul. And after 22 years, pianist Krystian Zimerman finally steps back onto the stage of the Seoul Arts Center. These two long-awaited returns will be joined by Finnish conductor and composer Esa-Pekka Salonen, making for one of the most anticipated events in Korea's classical music calendar this year. From June 26 to 28, audiences will witness performances that span from Beethoven's transcendence to Berlioz's hallucinatory vision, as these musical giants gather for a rare collaboration. Founded in 1842 and shaped by towering figures like Mahler and Bernstein, the New York Philharmonic now enters a new era under incoming music director Gustavo Dudamel, set to take the helm in 2026. In the meantime, the ensemble is led on this tour by Finnish conductor-composer Salonen, renowned for his architectural precision and intellectual clarity. The orchestra is not only a familiar name among classical music fans, but also a symbol of cultural diplomacy, having made international headlines in 2008 with its historic performance in Pyongyang, North Korea. Adding to the rarity is the return of Zimerman, widely regarded as one of the greatest living pianists. Known for his perfectionism, Zimerman last performed at the Seoul Arts Center in 2003 in his Korea debut recital and since then has limited his Seoul appearances to Lotte Concert Hall. His reunion with the New York Philharmonic, nearly 30 years after their last collaboration in 1996, is all the more symbolic given Zimerman's 2009 protest against US military policy, after which he vowed not to perform in the US -- a pledge he has upheld. The June 27 program opens with Beethoven's Piano Concerto No. 4, featuring Zimerman at the keyboard, followed by Beethoven's Symphony No. 3, 'Eroica.' The following evening shifts toward the French Impressionists and Romantics, as Salonen leads the orchestra through Ravel's "Mother Goose" suite, Debussy's 'La Mer' and Berlioz's 'Symphonie fantastique.' Art Center Incheon will host the same Beethoven program on June 26. Tickets range from 100,000 won ($72.55) to 530,000 won for June 27 and from 90,000 to 480,000 won for June 26 and 28.
Spectator
2 days ago
- Entertainment
- Spectator
Astonishing ‘lost tapes' from a piano great
These days the heart sinks when Deutsche Grammophon announces its new releases. I still shudder at the memory of Lang Lang's 2024 French album, in which he drooled over Ravel's Pavane pour une infante défunte; when I reviewed it I suggested that if the poor girl wasn't dead when he started, then she certainly was by the time he'd finished. Now she's been killed again, this time by the guitarist Robin Scherpen, whose Ravel Reimagined offers us 'a peaceful and serene soundscape'. Then there's Rêverie from Nemo Filou, a trio whose cocktail-lounge noodling allows 'the listener to drift off into bliss', and Sleep Circle, a 're-recorded version of the 2012 project Sleep' by DG's in-house snoozemeister Max Richter. But the funny thing is that over the past year I've spent more on DG products than I have for decades. Like its competitors, the company is frantically mining its back catalogue. That isn't exciting: I don't need fancy new packaging for CDs I bought in the 1990s. But there are also recordings remastered by Emil Berliner Studios, named after the man who founded Deutsche Grammophon in 1898 – and the results are stunning. EBS revisits the peaks of DG's catalogue, going back to the master tapes to recover audio information that was lost because the original sound engineers didn't have the right technology to extract it, or messed things up at the mixing desk. Although many of these new remasterings have been issued as CDs, SACDs or downloads, the cream of the crop is available only as pure analogue vinyl. Trust me: you haven't really heard Karajan's Mahler Fifth until you've invested £80 in the 'Original Source' LPs and played them with the best stylus you can afford. But now EBS has worked a digital miracle that you can hear on any streaming service. The Lost Tapes is an album of four Beethoven sonatas performed by Sviatoslav Richter in 1965, recorded for possible release but then mysteriously forgotten for nearly 60 years. They are taken from live concerts in France and Switzerland in which we hear the pianist at the top of his form in terrific sound – a frustratingly rare combination. Richter felt suffocated by microphones and you can hear a lack of spontaneity in many of his studio recordings. In contrast, some of his supreme flights of imagination are found in live concerts captured by wretched equipment. For example, his legendary 1958 Sofia performance of Pictures at an Exhibition, praised by critics for its 'staggering breadth of colour' and 'frenzied grotesquerie', sounds muffled or strident, depending on how you twiddle the knobs. In 1960 Richter made his American debut with six concerts in Carnegie Hall. Gripped by stage fright, under heavy KGB surveillance, he tore through Beethoven and Prokofiev sonatas, Schumann's Novelletten and Rachmaninov Preludes with a mixture of savagery and feathery delicacy. The end of Beethoven's Appassionata comes so close to breaking the sound barrier that you scarcely notice the finger-slips. Alas, the microphone was in the hands of a clueless stagehand – and when Sony reissued the recordings on CD they drained the colour out of the abrasive but vivid LP originals. But I was lucky enough to stumble on a version beautifully renovated by an amateur from an internet forum, and that sent me down the rabbit hole of the vast Richter discography. Thanks to years of obsessive-compulsive collecting, I can compare the four Lost Tapes Beethoven sonatas – opuses 31 no. 3, 90, 101 and 110 – with other Richter performances. The last of these, in A flat major, represents a unique milestone in the composer's journey; Antony Hopkins once suggested that the transformation of the fugue subject into ecstatic rhapsody is the moment when Beethoven – and music itself – finally severed the shackles of the classical style. A fanciful theory, perhaps, but that's how Richter plays it, the final bars exploding with joy. Is it a finer performance than the one he recorded in Moscow in the same year? No – it's almost identical, and the same is true of Op. 101 in A major, which Richter described as 'horribly difficult… even riskier than the Hammerklavier'. To quote Jed Distler's liner notes on this previously lost tape, we hear a 'bracingly effortless traversal of the Finale', in which the pianist 'untangles the knotty counterpoint with insouciant ease'. Richter was on fire in 1965, and his achievement in Moscow is every bit as jaw-dropping. The difference is the sound; in all the sonatas the pounding of Richter's left hand jolts you out of your seat and his ability to sustain a whisper at lightning speed defies belief. It's hard to think of other Richter recordings in which technique and sound quality are so gloriously matched. We're told that Emil Berliner Studios removed the tiniest pitch fluctuations and audience noises, something that wouldn't have been possible until recently and other technicians probably couldn't replicate. So, all things considered, perhaps we should be grateful that some idiot at Deutsche Grammophon left these tapes gathering dust until precisely the right moment.
