Frédéric François Chopin

Chopin’s youthful Piano Concerto No. 1 is dominated by the brilliant piano part that the teenage performer-composer wrote to showcase his extraordinary virtuosity.

Its ravishing Romanza (‘reviving in one’s soul beautiful memories’, as the composer described it) is framed by an opening movement rich in dramatic lyricism and a vivacious Rondo.

The Fantasy on Polish Airs, Op. 13 and the Rondo à la Krakowiak are similarly vehicles for Romantic reverie and bravura which pay tribute to the music of his homeland.

Eldar Nebolsin’s recording of Liszt’s piano concertos (8570517) was ranked “among the finest” by Gramophone.

Arthur Friedheim's close friendship with Liszt gives these piano roll recordings a unique & insightful perspective on the composer's music. The recording features Liszt's Harmonies du Soir, several Hungarian Rhapsodies as well as works by Chopin, Henselt & Gottschalk.

This 6CD set charts not only the development of the Nocturne as a musical form, but also the development of the piano from the closing years of the 18th and first half of the 19th centuries. Two great ‘piano schools’ had emerged, each having some of the greatest performers and composers of the day associated with them. Some of these composers were highly successful businessmen as well – Clementi and Pleyel in particular established highly successful piano manufacturing and music publishing firms. The English school, with its powerful instruments (of which the pianos of John Broadwood and Co are the best examples) enabled London based composers such as Cramer, Clementi and Dussek to write music with a singing almost bel canto quality. These large instruments had sustaining pedals long before the lighter, crisper sounding Vienese school pianos. Composers such as Hummel and Kalkbrenner were equally happy on either, but Hummel (a pupil of Mozart and friend of Beethoven) had a preference for the Viennese instrument as it managed to sound well against an orchestra, and it’s action was lighter and quicker than the English pianos. Chopin was greatly influenced by Clementi’s Irish pupil John Field. Field pioneered – indeed invented the musical nocturne, and Chopin played Field’s music throughout his life, eventually meeting him in 1833. The irascible and often drunk Field didn’t warm to Chopin: ‘he has the talent of the sick room’. Also included on these CDs are nocturnes and works by composers contemporaneous with Chopin – all the Field nocturnes performed on a Broadwood, and the great Third Sonata of Weber, a highly virtuosic work that displays the Viennese piano admirably. A generous selection of Chopin’s nocturnes and mazurkas and his early works complete this fascinating survey of piano music from the years between 1810 and 1850. Other information • Comprehensive booklet notes • Many rare works included • Chopin birth bi-centenary this year will see considerable interested in the composer and his world.

'In Chopin’s 21 Nocturnes we encounter some of the most sublimely beautiful music ever written for piano. The Romantic idiom of these “night songs,” with their atmosphere of yearning nostalgia, was perfectly matched with Chopin’s talents and inclinations. The genre of the nocturne was first developed by the Irish composer John Field. Chopin knew Field’s nocturnes well and built upon his foundation. Another source of inspiration was Italian bel canto opera, exemplified by the works of Chopin’s friend Vincenzo Bellini. Whatever his sources of inspiration, however, Chopin’s nocturnes represent the highest realization of the form, despite the fine subsequent efforts of composers including Schumann, Liszt, Tchaikovsky, Rachmaninoff, Fauré, Scriabin, and Szymanowski.' Vladimir Feltsman

“...Quite Simply An Amazing Pianist!” The New York Times

Vladimir Feltsman debuted with the Moscow Philharmonic at age 11. He studied at the Moscow Tchaikovsky, Moscow, and Leningrad (now St. Petersburg) Conservatories and went on to win the Grand Prix at the Marguerite Long International Piano Competition in Paris. In 1979, because of his growing discontent with the official Soviet ideology and rigid governmental control of the arts, Feltsman applied for an exit visa from the Soviet Union. In response, he was immediately banned from performing in public. After eight years of struggle and virtual artistic exile, he was finally granted permission to leave the Soviet Union. Upon his arrival in the United States in 1987, Vladimir Feltsman was warmly greeted at the White House, where he performed his very first concert in North America. That same year his debut at Carnegie Hall established him as a major pianist on the American scene.