Welcome to ClassicalConnect - the free classical music site!
ClassicalConnect is your virtual concert hall. It offers independent classical musicians the opportunity to be heard around the world while providing music lovers with a large selection of music performed by some of the most interesting musicians around. More...
If you are a musician, we urge you to sign up and upload your performances. Our site is a great way to share your music with the rest of the world! (For technical details, please click here)
If you are a casual music lover, you can listen to our playlists or browse through the music, selecting your favorite instruments. We have a great library of complete performances, from fleeting mazurkas to long sonatas and concertos. The library grows continuously with uploads from all over the world. Some of the compositions have been recorded by different performers, which we think creates a wonderful opportunity for comparing the music's different interpretations: our site has a unique feature created specifically for this purpose.
Once you have set up your account, you'll be able to select the type of music that plays when you enter the site. If you prefer a specific musical instrument, you could either select the most popular performances, or allow the system to pick the selection for that particular instrument. We call these lists "Top" and
"Serendipity." Piano music lovers, for example, could either make the "Top Piano" or "Piano: Serendipity" playlists as their starting point. Even if you don't have a preferred instrument, you could still select the option of playing the most popular performances among all the musical categories. Or, you could simply have the system make the choice for you.
After logging in, feel free to comment on any performance (just remember that artists can be very sensitive!). And of course, your vote counts on ClassicalConnect, so rate any piece using our 1 (lowest) to 10 (highest) scale. May we recommend that you reserve 10s for truly great performances and 1s only for the really awful ones?
As the ClassicalConnect community grows, you will be able to connect to fellow music lovers and musicians. You could send messages to your friends or join discussions. It's very easy to share an interesting performance with other users: simply click the Share button on the player and select the ID of your friend. You could even send a performance to friends who never visited the site: just copy the URL of a particular Performance Details page into an e-mail and send it (Performance Details is the page that appears when you click on the Details button in the Player or on the title of the piece when you search or brows the library). When your correspondent receive the e-mail, he or she will click on the Play button, the Player will appear and start that particular performance. Try it!
In the near future, we plan to add several interesting features that we hope will only enhance your experience. We will keep you informed about all new developments.
We appreciate all your ideas and comments, so please let us know what you think: just use the Site Functionality and Issues forum, or send us a message.
Enjoy!
ClassicalConnect
Less...
At the moment, our site only accepts MP3 files, so if you have a CD recording, you can rip and upload it in this format. For higher quality, we recommend using a bit rate of 128 kbps, audio sample rate of 44 kHz, and a two-channel (stereo) format.
To upload, enter the complete title of the piece, including its key, number, opus, etc. For example, the title of Beethoven's Sonata No. 21 would be identified as Sonata No. 21 in C Major, Op. 53. "Waldstein" is optional - especially considering that in some countries, it is known as "L'Aurora." You can also leave comments about your own performance.
Please do not upload parts of a composition. Think of ClassicalConnect as your virtual concert hall: upload only the things you would play in a real one.
If you have any questions, please contact us by clicking here and sending us an e-mail. We'll make every effort to respond as quickly as possible.
Less...
From our Historical Interviews: Bruce Duffie talks with the pianist Ursula Oppens
Bruce Duffie: Once the record is released and you’re pleased with it, do you then find that you’re competing against that recording when you play that work in public? Ursula Oppens: I haven’t been playing my recorded repertoire specifically. It isn’t like a rock group that might make a record and tour with it. I’m sure if I did that more, I would change my interpretations more because they do change over time. And it depends on what kind of piece it is. A piece like the Carter Night Fantasies is very much a performer’s piece about expression. So that one changes every time you play it! I couldn’t play three performances the same. In fact, I’ve done it ten days in a row and it was different every time because it was that kind of a piece. BD: Is one better than the other, or are they all just different? UO: They’re just different. There are different elements in the piece that somehow become more focused. It could be a different piano. If a piano has a particular register that’s very interesting or very beautiful, the music in that register sounds better than it usually does and becomes somehow a more important part of the piece. So if that music is more exciting, then you adjust the others so it will be in some sensible proportion! So it just happens.
From our Historical Interviews:
Bruce Duffie talks with the oboist Alex Klein
Bruce Duffie: ...When someone plays a recording, it will be exactly the same thing every time it’s played. Is there any ambiguity for you when you make a recording? Alex Klein: My recordings are not as authentic as a live performance, because I realize it’s going to be listened to several times, and analyzed as a document. A recording is a document. It’s something that I write down in my computer, and then I do a spell-checker, and then I come back to the next day and revise one paragraph. We cut and paste. We say, “Well in this passage, by the time we played it the fifth time it got a little bit better, so let’s paste that one in.” So we create a document that can be published. It lacks the authenticity, but it still carries a lot of information. If people like the recording, they’ll probably like a live performance better in terms of carrying emotions. But a live performance can never carry as much information as a document. BD: So they’re two separate things that should exist in parallel? AK: Yeah, exactly....
March 8, 2010.Elena Kuschnerova is a Russian-born, German-based "pianist who grabs the imagination," according to the late New York Times critic Harold Schonberg, who also praised her Scriabin recordings. Elena studied at the Moscow Conservatory with Sergei Dorensky. She was influenced by the great and controversial Russian composer Alexander Lokshin (1920-1987), who wrote a variation cycle for her. Ms. Kuschnerova established herself in Germany in 1992. Her recitals and CDs encompass a wide range, from Bach to first performances of works composed for her. The following “virtual recital” will include: J.S. Bach’s Prelude and Fugue in c minor, from the first volume of the Well-Tempered Clavier, followed by Intermezzo No. 2 in A Major, Op. 118 by Johannes Brahms. We will then hear Scriabin’s Etude No. 12 in d-sharp minor, Op. 8 and Prokofiev’s March from the opera Love to the three oranges." We’ll conclude with Alexander Lokshin’s Prelude and Theme with Variations. It was written in 1982 and dedicated to Elena Kuschnerova. To listen, click here.
March 1, 2010. Chopin 200! Yes, Frédéric Chopin was born on March 1 200 years ago! So, without further ado, let’s celebrate. We’ll hear pianists from many countries. Mara Dobresco of France plays the Valse in e minor, Op. Posth.; Elena Kuschnerova of Germany – the Nocturne in D-flat Major, Op. 27, No. 2; Bill-John Newbrough – the Grande Valse Brillante in E-flat Major, Op. 18; Konstantyn Travinsky of Ukraine plays Etude Op. 25, No. 12 in c minor and Valse Op. 70, No. 1 in G-flat Major; Dmitry Paperno, formerly of Russia, plays the Mazurka in A-flat Major, Op. 41, No. 4; John Ferguson – the Nocturne in c minor, Op. 48, No. 1; Spencer Myer plays the Polonaise-Fantaisie, Op. 61; Elena Baksht, another former Russian pianist, plays the Scherzo No. 2 in b-flat minor; and Hayk Arsenyan, the pianist born in Armenia, plays the Ballade No. 2 in F major, Op. 38. To listen, click here.
February 22, 2010. George Frideric Handel was born on February 23, 1685, 225 years ago, in the German city of Halle, Saxony. He went on to study in Italy, settling in London in 1712 and later becoming a British subject. Handel was known for his operas in his lifetime (he wrote 62 of them, most in the Italian style), which fell out of vogue soon after his death but are enjoying a revival today thanks to artists like Cecilia Bartoli. We created this playlist to commemorate Handel’s anniversary. We start with the pianist Margarita Shevchenko playing Chaconne in G Major. Following that, the baritone Raymond Feener sings the aria Arm, arm ye brave from the great oratorio Judas Maccabaeus. In conclusion, the guitarist Charles Mokotoff solos in Concerto in B-flat Major for Guitar and Strings. To listen, click here.
February 15, 2010. The young pianist Irina Klyuev was born in Nikšić, Montenegro. She started her studies in her hometown and then continued on at the University of Montenegro. Later in London, she studied with Leonid Kontorovsky and Irina Ossipova, among others. There she received the John Lill and Colin Davis scholarships, and later took classes with Jeno Jando at the Royal Academy of Music, Dublin. Irina Klyuev was among the winners of a number of international piano competitions. We’ll hear Irina play J.S. Bach’s Prelude and Fugue in B flat minor, from Book 2 of Well-Tempered Clavier. She then performs Ondine, from Ravel’s Gaspar de la Nuit. We’ll conclude with two rarely performed pieces. First comes Arnold Schoenberg’s angular Piano Piece no. 3, and then a little bon-bon from the mid-19th century French composer and pianist Charles-Valentin Alkan called Allegro Barbaro. To listen, click here.
February 8, 2010. John Ferguson is a pianist whose performances have been praised for their “proselytizing zeal” and "impressive qualities of pianistic brilliance.” He’s also a composer and a conductor. His recitals feature some of the most difficult works in keyboard literature, including Beethoven's "Hammerklavier" Sonata, Bach's Art of Fugue, and Rzewski's The People United Will Never be Defeated. Ferguson's performances have also included such rarities as Liszt's arrangements of Beethoven's symphonies, music from the Renaissance and the Middle Ages, and a wide range of contemporary music, including his own compositions. We’ll hear Franz Liszt’s Legend no. 2 "St. Francis Walking on the Waves," then Allegretto from Beethoven’s Symphony No. 7, arranged for the piano by Liszt. We’ll continue with Mr. Ferguson’s own composition, Duo for Piano and Vibraphone. We’ll then hear Sonata V for prepared piano by John Cage’s and will conclude with Anton Webern’s Five Pieces for Orchestra Op. 10, with Mr. Ferguson conducting. To listen, click here.
February 1, 2010. Franz Schubert, the great Austrian composer, was born on January 31, 1797 in Alsergrund, which is now a part of Vienna. He lived most of his life in that city and died a short 31 years later. Still, he left us with a large body of work of supreme quality, including more than 600 Lieder, great piano sonatas and other instrumental music, and nine symphonies. We created a small playlist to celebrate Schubert’s birthday. First, you’ll hear Impromptu Op. 90 No. 3, played by the pianist Xiang Zou; then an arrangement for the violin of the song Ave Maria, played by Albert Markov. We follow with two Lieder: Der Wanderer an den Mond, sung by the baritone Thomas Meglioranza, and Im Frühling, performed by the soprano Hyunah Yu. We’ll finish with the Wanderer Fantasy, played by the pianist Alon Goldstein. To listen, click here.
January 25, 2010. Jeffrey Biegel is one of today's most respected artists, having created a multi-faceted career as a pianist, composer and arranger. His recent recordings include Leroy Anderson's 'Concerto in C,' conducted by Leonard Slatkin with the BBC Concert Orchestra and his own Vivaldi transcriptions for piano, both on the Naxos label. He also recorded the complete Sonatas by Mozart for the e1 label. Mr. Biegel is currently assembling a global commissioning project for Ellen Taaffe Zwilich's next work for piano and orchestra for the 2011-13 seasons. In 2010, Naxos will release Mr. Biegel's world premiere recording of Ellen Taaffe Zwilich's Millennium Fantasy (2000) and Peanuts Gallery. Mr. Biegel joined 18 co-commissioning orchestras for Lowell Liebermann's Concerto no. 3 for Piano and Orchestra, composed exclusively for him for the 2006-07-08 seasons.
We have a large selection of Mr. Biegels’s recordings, but today we’re presenting just one piece, Rachmaninov’s Piano Concerto no. 3 in d minor. To listen, click here.
January 18, 2010.Gary Noland’s music has received very high praise from some of this era’s leading musicians. He was born in Seattle in 1957 and raised in Berkeley, next to the famous People’s Park. As an adolescent, Gary lived for a time in Salzburg and Garmisch-Partenkirchen (home of Richard Strauss), where he absorbed many musical influences. He studied music at U.C. Berkeley, then at the Boston Conservatory, and finally Harvard University, where he received a Ph.D. Gary confesses to having “very restless tonal ears” and feels closest to composers with “all-encompassing” harmonic palettes, such as Strauss, Mahler, Korngold, Hugo Wolf, Ernst von Dohnanyi, David del Tredici, Frederic Rzewski and György Ligeti, to name just a few. He’s not terribly fond of “harmonically limited” music... We create a playlist consisting of the following works: Fantasy in E Minor for cello & piano (Op. 24), Humoresque for piano (Op. 3), Romance for viola & piano (Op. 10), Grande Rag Brillante (Op. 15), and Septet for clarinet, alto sax, French horn, two violins, double bass, and piano (Op. 43). To listen, click here.
January 11, 2010. The pianist Beth Levin is an acclaimed recitalist, concerto soloist, chamber musician and recording artist. Her repertory is broad, from Bach's Goldberg Variations to Beethoven's Diabelli Variations, to the romantics such as Schubert and Chopin. You can listen to the Diabelli in our library, but today we decided to present a selection from the recently uploaded complete set of 24 piano Preludes Op. 28 by Frédéric Chopin. Here are eight of them: no. 4 in e minor; no.7 in A major, no. 8 in f-sharp minor, no. 11 in B major, no. 12 in g-sharp minor, no. 13 in F-sharp major, no. 15 in D-flat major ("Raindrop Prelude"), and no. 19 in E-flat major. To listen, click here.
January 4, 2010. This week is especially rich in birthdays. Five talented composers were born between January 3 and January 9: Giovanni Pergolesi, Nikolai Medtner, Max Bruch, Alexander Scriabin and Francis Poulenc. We could play the music of these composers for many hours, but we have to be reasonable. So here is this week's playlist: we'll start with Medtner's Canzona serenata, from Forgotten Motives Op. 38, played by the Russian pianist Dmitry Paperno. Medtner is not particularly popular these days, but together with Scriabin and Rachmaninov, he was one of the most important Russian composers of the early 20th century. Then we'll hear two etudes by Scriabin: Etude in c-sharp minor, Op. 2, No. 1, played by the pianist Soyeon Lee; and Etude in c-sharp minor, Op. 42 No. 5, in Daniil Trifonov's interpretation. After these three Romantic pieces, we'll hear a very different performance: Poulenc's Sonata for Clarinet and Piano played by Alexander Fiterstein. To listen, click here.
Welcome to ClassicalConnect - the free classical music site!
ClassicalConnect is your virtual concert hall. It offers independent classical musicians the opportunity to be heard around the world while providing music lovers with a large selection of music performed by some of the most interesting musicians around. More...
If you are a musician, we urge you to sign up and upload your performances. Our site is a great way to share your music with the rest of the world! (For technical details, please click here)
If you are a casual music lover, you can listen to our playlists or browse through the music, selecting your favorite instruments. We have a great library of complete performances, from fleeting mazurkas to long sonatas and concertos. The library grows continuously with uploads from all over the world. Some of the compositions have been recorded by different performers, which we think creates a wonderful opportunity for comparing the music's different interpretations: our site has a unique feature created specifically for this purpose.
Once you have set up your account, you'll be able to select the type of music that plays when you enter the site. If you prefer a specific musical instrument, you could either select the most popular performances, or allow the system to pick the selection for that particular instrument. We call these lists "Top" and "Serendipity." Piano music lovers, for example, could either make the "Top Piano" or "Piano: Serendipity" playlists as their starting point. Even if you don't have a preferred instrument, you could still select the option of playing the most popular performances among all the musical categories. Or, you could simply have the system make the choice for you.
After logging in, feel free to comment on any performance (just remember that artists can be very sensitive!). And of course, your vote counts on ClassicalConnect, so rate any piece using our 1 (lowest) to 10 (highest) scale. May we recommend that you reserve 10s for truly great performances and 1s only for the really awful ones?
As the ClassicalConnect community grows, you will be able to connect to fellow music lovers and musicians. You could send messages to your friends or join discussions. It's very easy to share an interesting performance with other users: simply click the Share button on the player and select the ID of your friend. You could even send a performance to friends who never visited the site: just copy the URL of a particular Performance Details page into an e-mail and send it (Performance Details is the page that appears when you click on the Details button in the Player or on the title of the piece when you search or brows the library). When your correspondent receive the e-mail, he or she will click on the Play button, the Player will appear and start that particular performance. Try it!
In the near future, we plan to add several interesting features that we hope will only enhance your experience. We will keep you informed about all new developments.
We appreciate all your ideas and comments, so please let us know what you think: just use the Site Functionality and Issues forum, or send us a message.
Enjoy!
ClassicalConnect
Less...At the moment, our site only accepts MP3 files, so if you have a CD recording, you can rip and upload it in this format. For higher quality, we recommend using a bit rate of 128 kbps, audio sample rate of 44 kHz, and a two-channel (stereo) format.
To upload, enter the complete title of the piece, including its key, number, opus, etc. For example, the title of Beethoven's Sonata No. 21 would be identified as Sonata No. 21 in C Major, Op. 53. "Waldstein" is optional - especially considering that in some countries, it is known as "L'Aurora." You can also leave comments about your own performance.
Please do not upload parts of a composition. Think of ClassicalConnect as your virtual concert hall: upload only the things you would play in a real one.
If you have any questions, please contact us by clicking here and sending us an e-mail. We'll make every effort to respond as quickly as possible.
Less...From our Historical Interviews:
Bruce Duffie talks with the pianist Ursula Oppens
Bruce Duffie: Once the record is released and you’re pleased with it, do you then find that you’re competing against that recording when you play that work in public?
Read more: 1 2 3 4Ursula Oppens: I haven’t been playing my recorded repertoire specifically. It isn’t like a rock group that might make a record and tour with it. I’m sure if I did that more, I would change my interpretations more because they do change over time. And it depends on what kind of piece it is. A piece like the Carter Night Fantasies is very much a performer’s piece about expression. So that one changes every time you play it! I couldn’t play three performances the same. In fact, I’ve done it ten days in a row and it was different every time because it was that kind of a piece.
BD: Is one better than the other, or are they all just different?
UO: They’re just different. There are different elements in the piece that somehow become more focused. It could be a different piano. If a piano has a particular register that’s very interesting or very beautiful, the music in that register sounds better than it usually does and becomes somehow a more important part of the piece. So if that music is more exciting, then you adjust the others so it will be in some sensible proportion! So it just happens.
From our Historical Interviews:
Bruce Duffie talks with the oboist Alex Klein
Bruce Duffie: ...When someone plays a recording, it will be exactly the same thing every time it’s played. Is there any ambiguity for you when you make a recording?
Read more: 1 2 3 4Alex Klein: My recordings are not as authentic as a live performance, because I realize it’s going to be listened to several times, and analyzed as a document. A recording is a document. It’s something that I write down in my computer, and then I do a spell-checker, and then I come back to the next day and revise one paragraph. We cut and paste. We say, “Well in this passage, by the time we played it the fifth time it got a little bit better, so let’s paste that one in.” So we create a document that can be published. It lacks the authenticity, but it still carries a lot of information. If people like the recording, they’ll probably like a live performance better in terms of carrying emotions. But a live performance can never carry as much information as a document.
BD: So they’re two separate things that should exist in parallel?
AK: Yeah, exactly....
March 8, 2010. Elena Kuschnerova is a Russian-born, German-based "pianist who grabs the imagination," according to the late New York Times critic Harold Schonberg, who also praised her Scriabin recordings. Elena studied at the Moscow Conservatory with Sergei Dorensky. She was influenced by the great and controversial Russian composer Alexander Lokshin (1920-1987), who wrote a variation cycle for her. Ms. Kuschnerova established herself in Germany in 1992. Her recitals and CDs encompass a wide range, from Bach to first performances of works composed for her. The following “virtual recital” will include: J.S. Bach’s Prelude and Fugue in c minor, from the first volume of the Well-Tempered Clavier, followed by Intermezzo No. 2 in A Major, Op. 118 by Johannes Brahms. We will then hear Scriabin’s Etude No. 12 in d-sharp minor, Op. 8 and Prokofiev’s March from the opera Love to the three oranges." We’ll conclude with Alexander Lokshin’s Prelude and Theme with Variations. It was written in 1982 and dedicated to Elena Kuschnerova. To listen, click here.
March 1, 2010. Chopin 200! Yes, Frédéric Chopin was born on March 1 200 years ago! So, without further ado, let’s celebrate. We’ll hear pianists from many countries. Mara Dobresco of France plays the Valse in e minor, Op. Posth.; Elena Kuschnerova of Germany – the Nocturne in D-flat Major, Op. 27, No. 2; Bill-John Newbrough – the Grande Valse Brillante in E-flat Major, Op. 18; Konstantyn Travinsky of Ukraine plays Etude Op. 25, No. 12 in c minor and Valse Op. 70, No. 1 in G-flat Major; Dmitry Paperno, formerly of Russia, plays the Mazurka in A-flat Major, Op. 41, No. 4; John Ferguson – the Nocturne in c minor, Op. 48, No. 1; Spencer Myer plays the Polonaise-Fantaisie, Op. 61; Elena Baksht, another former Russian pianist, plays the Scherzo No. 2 in b-flat minor; and Hayk Arsenyan, the pianist born in Armenia, plays the Ballade No. 2 in F major, Op. 38. To listen, click here.
February 22, 2010. George Frideric Handel was born on February 23, 1685, 225 years ago, in the German city of Halle, Saxony. He went on to study in Italy, settling in London in 1712 and later becoming a British subject. Handel was known for his operas in his lifetime (he wrote 62 of them, most in the Italian style), which fell out of vogue soon after his death but are enjoying a revival today thanks to artists like Cecilia Bartoli. We created this playlist to commemorate Handel’s anniversary. We start with the pianist Margarita Shevchenko playing Chaconne in G Major. Following that, the baritone Raymond Feener sings the aria Arm, arm ye brave from the great oratorio Judas Maccabaeus. In conclusion, the guitarist Charles Mokotoff solos in Concerto in B-flat Major for Guitar and Strings. To listen, click here.
February 15, 2010. The young pianist Irina Klyuev was born in Nikšić, Montenegro. She started her studies in her hometown and then continued on at the University of Montenegro. Later in London, she studied with Leonid Kontorovsky and Irina Ossipova, among others. There she received the John Lill and Colin Davis scholarships, and later took classes with Jeno Jando at the Royal Academy of Music, Dublin. Irina Klyuev was among the winners of a number of international piano competitions. We’ll hear Irina play J.S. Bach’s Prelude and Fugue in B flat minor, from Book 2 of Well-Tempered Clavier. She then performs Ondine, from Ravel’s Gaspar de la Nuit. We’ll conclude with two rarely performed pieces. First comes Arnold Schoenberg’s angular Piano Piece no. 3, and then a little bon-bon from the mid-19th century French composer and pianist Charles-Valentin Alkan called Allegro Barbaro. To listen, click here.
February 8, 2010. John Ferguson is a pianist whose performances have been praised for their “proselytizing zeal” and "impressive qualities of pianistic brilliance.” He’s also a composer and a conductor. His recitals feature some of the most difficult works in keyboard literature, including Beethoven's "Hammerklavier" Sonata, Bach's Art of Fugue, and Rzewski's The People United Will Never be Defeated. Ferguson's performances have also included such rarities as Liszt's arrangements of Beethoven's symphonies, music from the Renaissance and the Middle Ages, and a wide range of contemporary music, including his own compositions. We’ll hear Franz Liszt’s Legend no. 2 "St. Francis Walking on the Waves," then Allegretto from Beethoven’s Symphony No. 7, arranged for the piano by Liszt. We’ll continue with Mr. Ferguson’s own composition, Duo for Piano and Vibraphone. We’ll then hear Sonata V for prepared piano by John Cage’s and will conclude with Anton Webern’s Five Pieces for Orchestra Op. 10, with Mr. Ferguson conducting. To listen, click here.
February 1, 2010. Franz Schubert, the great Austrian composer, was born on January 31, 1797 in Alsergrund, which is now a part of Vienna. He lived most of his life in that city and died a short 31 years later. Still, he left us with a large body of work of supreme quality, including more than 600 Lieder, great piano sonatas and other instrumental music, and nine symphonies. We created a small playlist to celebrate Schubert’s birthday. First, you’ll hear Impromptu Op. 90 No. 3, played by the pianist Xiang Zou; then an arrangement for the violin of the song Ave Maria, played by Albert Markov. We follow with two Lieder: Der Wanderer an den Mond, sung by the baritone Thomas Meglioranza, and Im Frühling, performed by the soprano Hyunah Yu. We’ll finish with the Wanderer Fantasy, played by the pianist Alon Goldstein. To listen, click here.
January 25, 2010. Jeffrey Biegel is one of today's most respected artists, having created a multi-faceted career as a pianist, composer and arranger. His recent recordings include Leroy Anderson's 'Concerto in C,' conducted by Leonard Slatkin with the BBC Concert Orchestra and his own Vivaldi transcriptions for piano, both on the Naxos label. He also recorded the complete Sonatas by Mozart for the e1 label. Mr. Biegel is currently assembling a global commissioning project for Ellen Taaffe Zwilich's next work for piano and orchestra for the 2011-13 seasons. In 2010, Naxos will release Mr. Biegel's world premiere recording of Ellen Taaffe Zwilich's Millennium Fantasy (2000) and Peanuts Gallery. Mr. Biegel joined 18 co-commissioning orchestras for Lowell Liebermann's Concerto no. 3 for Piano and Orchestra, composed exclusively for him for the 2006-07-08 seasons.
We have a large selection of Mr. Biegels’s recordings, but today we’re presenting just one piece, Rachmaninov’s Piano Concerto no. 3 in d minor. To listen, click here.
January 18, 2010. Gary Noland’s music has received very high praise from some of this era’s leading musicians. He was born in Seattle in 1957 and raised in Berkeley, next to the famous People’s Park. As an adolescent, Gary lived for a time in Salzburg and Garmisch-Partenkirchen (home of Richard Strauss), where he absorbed many musical influences. He studied music at U.C. Berkeley, then at the Boston Conservatory, and finally Harvard University, where he received a Ph.D. Gary confesses to having “very restless tonal ears” and feels closest to composers with “all-encompassing” harmonic palettes, such as Strauss, Mahler, Korngold, Hugo Wolf, Ernst von Dohnanyi, David del Tredici, Frederic Rzewski and György Ligeti, to name just a few. He’s not terribly fond of “harmonically limited” music... We create a playlist consisting of the following works: Fantasy in E Minor for cello & piano (Op. 24), Humoresque for piano (Op. 3), Romance for viola & piano (Op. 10), Grande Rag Brillante (Op. 15), and Septet for clarinet, alto sax, French horn, two violins, double bass, and piano (Op. 43). To listen, click here.
January 11, 2010. The pianist Beth Levin is an acclaimed recitalist, concerto soloist, chamber musician and recording artist. Her repertory is broad, from Bach's Goldberg Variations to Beethoven's Diabelli Variations, to the romantics such as Schubert and Chopin. You can listen to the Diabelli in our library, but today we decided to present a selection from the recently uploaded complete set of 24 piano Preludes Op. 28 by Frédéric Chopin. Here are eight of them: no. 4 in e minor; no.7 in A major, no. 8 in f-sharp minor, no. 11 in B major, no. 12 in g-sharp minor, no. 13 in F-sharp major, no. 15 in D-flat major ("Raindrop Prelude"), and no. 19 in E-flat major. To listen, click here.
January 4, 2010. This week is especially rich in birthdays. Five talented composers were born between January 3 and January 9: Giovanni Pergolesi, Nikolai Medtner, Max Bruch, Alexander Scriabin and Francis Poulenc. We could play the music of these composers for many hours, but we have to be reasonable. So here is this week's playlist: we'll start with Medtner's Canzona serenata, from Forgotten Motives Op. 38, played by the Russian pianist Dmitry Paperno. Medtner is not particularly popular these days, but together with Scriabin and Rachmaninov, he was one of the most important Russian composers of the early 20th century. Then we'll hear two etudes by Scriabin: Etude in c-sharp minor, Op. 2, No. 1, played by the pianist Soyeon Lee; and Etude in c-sharp minor, Op. 42 No. 5, in Daniil Trifonov's interpretation. After these three Romantic pieces, we'll hear a very different performance: Poulenc's Sonata for Clarinet and Piano played by Alexander Fiterstein. To listen, click here.