Pianist Khatia Buniatishvili Releases Debut CD of Music devoted to Franz Liszt in Celebration of Liszt's 200th Birthday

By -

Available July 5, 2011


The extremely gifted young Georgian pianist is devoting her debut album on Sony Classical, available July 5, to Franz Liszt in celebration of the composer’s 200th birthday this fall. Although Buniatishvili sees herself as belonging truly to the 21st century, like the Romantics she looks for greatness in small things and for the universal in the individual. In the music of Liszt, she seeks and finds her idea of musical completeness and pianistic perfection, saying that "only he would enable me to present as a unity the many aspects of my soul."

On the recording, Buniatishvili begins with Liszt’s third Liebestraum, a story of the intensity and passion of love which is also characterized by the thought from Goethe’s Faust: “O stay! Thou art so fair!”. The centerpiece of the recording, however, Liszt’s Sonata in B Minor, is technically one of the most demanding works ever written for piano. It caused a stir in Liszt’s lifetime because of its innovative orchestral treatment of the piano and because it consists of only one movement, encompassing an abundance of characters and types of motion in one single, great span.

The next piece on the recording is Liszt’s first Mephisto Waltz (“The Dance in the Village Tavern”), which was inspired by an episode in Nikolaus Lenau’s Faust poem: Amid the demonic dance set off by Mephisto, full of staccato harmonies, lightning scales, and sudden changes of harmony, appears a delicate voice that can be decoded as that of the loving Gretchen. Liszt composed La Lugubre Gondola, which follows, shortly before the death of his son-in-law Richard Wagner, after Liszt had stayed with Wagner in Venice for some time. The work ends with a whole-tone scale and the note G sharp, leading into the key of the last piece on the recording, Liszt’s arrangement of Bach’s transfiguring Prelude and Fugue in A Minor.

Khatia Buniatishvili stands at the outset of a promising career and is regarded as one of the great pianists of the future. Martha Argerich praised her astonishing musical imagination and brilliant virtuosity. Gidon Kremer, who sees her as one of the greatest talents of recent years, chose Buniatishvili as his chamber music partner at venues including the Lockenhaus Festival and the Wiener Musikverein.

Comments

Post a Comment

Popular posts from this blog

The Role of Music in Opera

By -
There are numerous books on the topic, and every composer, librettist, director, singer and audience member has their opinion as to what role the music should play in an opera. In a play without music, the words ought to support the meaning behind a character's actions. However, in the case of action movies, often times the action is what tells the story and there aren't words, just images to forward the plot. We might hear music to accompany action, build tension, but the action tells the story. Musicals tend to speak until the emotion of the moment just "has" to break out in song - unless it's something like "Mama Mia" where the dialog is the rails we travel on between songs; the songs themselves, written before the concept of the musical, are the focus of the production, while the story is secondary. Operas are a different beast. The music provides emotion to the words spoken, but it also plays the role of ambience when there is only action. In ...
Read more

Episode 210b: Joyeuse le départ

By -
Image
Podcast:  Play in new window  |  Download Subscribe:  Apple Podcasts  |  Android  |  Google Play  |  Stitcher  |  TuneIn  |  RSS Provost Cunningham has Transmigrated, but to where! What is Dr Sage going to do with his body? And how can she bring home her friends, Abigail and Erasmus, without also bring home Cunningham? What are they going to say when they find the “skeleton” she’s hiding in her closet? Cast: Eddie Louise Clark  as Dr Sage Chip Clark  as Professor Savant Justin Bremer  as the Narrator Emily Riley Piatt  as Abigail Entwhistle, Calypso & Dean Stewart Written by  Eddie Louise Theme music by  Unwoman Sound Design by  Chip Michael
Read more

Teaching Composition – What are we trying to achieve

By -
In the process of learning composition I have spent time with a number of instructors who have encouraged me to write twelve-tone, pitch-class, electro-acoustic and other forms of experimental techniques. No matter how much I might understand and appreciate the work of other composers in the genres, these are not forms of music I resonate with. They are simply not forms of music I listen to and I struggle with the idea of writing them. However, in a Master Class by Libby Larsen she made the comment, “Learn them all, because all forms of music have something to offer.” This I very much agree. There are elements of each of the above mentioned forms (and others) that I do resonate with. Berg’s Violin Concerto is a beautiful twelve-tone work, although it is possible to look at numerous sections of the music with a “tonal” analysis. Another composer friend, Gary Bachlund commented that using these techniques can narrow the choices for how to compose a piece of work. If you look at ...
Read more