Support our efforts, sign up to a full membership!
(Start for free)
Register or login with just your e-mail address
Classical 06/01/2023

Fantasy, Ecstasy, Despair Pianist Benjamin Grosvenor Records Robert And Clara Schumann, With Brahms

Hot Songs Around The World

Happy
Pharrell Williams
1256 entries in 35 charts
Cruel Summer
Taylor Swift
349 entries in 20 charts
Paint The Town Red
Doja Cat
326 entries in 28 charts
Greedy
Tate McRae
223 entries in 26 charts
Lover
Taylor Swift
208 entries in 15 charts
Prada
Casso, Raye & D-Block Europe
237 entries in 19 charts
Fast Car
Luke Combs
274 entries in 12 charts
Blinding Lights
Weeknd
1780 entries in 33 charts
Strangers
Kenya Grace
217 entries in 24 charts
Calm Down
Rema
960 entries in 23 charts
Dance The Night
Dua Lipa
411 entries in 27 charts
Until I Found You
Stephen Sanchez
190 entries in 16 charts
Houdini
Dua Lipa
33 entries in 23 charts
All I Want For Christmas Is You
Mariah Carey
1153 entries in 28 charts
Fantasy, Ecstasy, Despair Pianist Benjamin Grosvenor Records Robert And Clara Schumann, With Brahms
New York, NY (Top40 Charts) The acclaimed British pianist, Benjamin Grosvenor, still only 30 and yet a well-established favourite of critics and audiences around the globe, takes Robert Schumann's haunting Kreisleriana as his starting point in his new album, Schumann & Brahms. This eight-movement work portrays the mercurial personality of the fictional Johannes Kreisler, created by E. T. A. Hoffmann: Kreisler's highs and lows, and his dreamy nature, clearly mirror Schumann's own tragic manic-depressive tendencies. Grosvenor responds to the composer's autobiographical honesty with playing of sublime tenderness, dazzling variety, and imaginative empathy.

He accompanies the work with the melancholic Variations on a Theme by Robert Schumann by Schumann's beloved wife Clara (who, incidentally, stated that she was much disturbed by the visions conjured up in Kreisleriana). Further kaleidoscopic variety is provided by Robert's Blumenstück, and Quasi Variazione: Andantino de Clara Wieck. The recital also includes Brahms' Three Intermezzi, autumnal works which shed a fascinating light on the complicated relationship which existed between Robert, Clara and Brahms himself. Grosvenor's own arrangement of Robert's Abendlied completes the programme.

The recording is Benjamin Grosvenor's seventh for Decca since 2011, when he became the youngest musician - and also the first British pianist in more than sixty years - to sign to the label. Since then he has won inter alia several Gramophone Awards, and the prestigious Diapason d'Or de l'année. After a spectacular win, at the age of just 11, in the keyboard section of the BBC Young Musician competition, he went on to become the youngest soloist ever to appear at the opening night of the BBC Proms in 2011.

That extraordinary promise, shown so early in his career, continues to delight and move audiences worldwide, with regular appearances at international concert halls from Chicago to Paris.

'You have to pinch yourself to believe what he is doing... he creates waves of passion with grandeur, urgency and panache' (Diapason, 2021); 'He provokes sheer wonder' (Hamburger Abendblatt, 2021); 'A prodigious gift for storytelling' (Musical America, 2019). His performances of Schumann have come in for particular praise: 'Presented some of the finest Schumann playing I have encountered in a long time… Grosvenor has the music's full measure' (Seen and Heard, 2021); 'I often thought that I had never heard Kreisleriana sound so beautiful' (Culture, 2019). 

​Grosvenor also has a hugely impressive online following, and can boast hundreds of thousands of views and streams of his performances on Spotify, YouTube and other platforms. With the passionate, mercurial and uniquely oneiric performance he offers on his latest release, that success looks set to continue. 

R. Schumann
Kreisleriana, Op.16
i. Äußerst bewegt
ii. Sehr innig und nicht zu rasch
iii. Sehr aufgeregt
iv. Sehr langsam
v. Sehr lebhaft
vi. Sehr langsam
vii. Sehr rasch
viii. Schnell und spielend
3 Romanzen, Op. 28, No. 2 in F-Sharp Major (Einfach)
Blumenstück, Op.19
Piano Sonata No. 3 in F Minor, Op. 14: III. Quasi variazioni (Andantino de Clara Wieck)
Abendlied, Op. 85 No. 12

C. Schumann
Variations on a Theme by Robert Schumann, Op. 20

Brahms
Intermezzi, Op. 117
1. In E-Flat Major
2. In B-Flat Major
3. In C-Sharp Minor






Most read news of the week


© 2001-2023
top40-charts.com (S4)
about | site map
contact | privacy
Page gen. in 0.5372930 secs // 4 () queries in 0.0049064159393311 secs


live