After more than twenty years of recording for the major labels, I decided to create my own. The venture was launched in January 2001, at the dawn of the 21st century; hence my choice of PIANO 21 as an appropriate title. This is the vehicle for my own recordings, some of them of live performances. They comprise both new recordings and tracks from private and radiophonic archives from various countries as well as re-issues. PIANO 21 gives expression to my twofold passion to share not only music from the major repertoire – naturally – but also the discovery of rare and less well known works.
P21 044-N
Brahms, Sonata for Two Pianos in F minor, op. 34 b
Schumann, Piano Quintet in E flat major, op. 44 arranged for piano four hands by Clara Schumann
This recording brings together two major works from the history of romantic chamber music. It embraces Robert Schumann, the composer, Clara, his transcriber and indefatigable performer of his work, and Johannes Brahms, their intimate friend, revisiting in these piano arrangements their masterpieces: Schumann’s Quintet op. 44 and Brahms’ Quintet op. 34. Whereas we may already be familiar with the Sonata in F minor, the two-piano version of Brahms’ Quintet for piano and strings, the four-handed version of Robert Schumann’s Quintet may prove to be a discovery. Arranged by Clara Schumann just after the composer’s death, this work bears witness to the importance in the 19th century of the practice of four-hand piano works as a driver of musical progress.
