Schumann: Blumenstück, Op. 19

With a flourishing international concert career and an acclaimed discography, Freddy Kempf has become firmly established among the top pianists of today. His very first disc, at the age of 22, was a Schumann recital that made reviewers around the world sit up and take notice.

Kempf now returns to Schumann, with these three solo piano works. The Études symphoniques is one of Schumann’s most imposing piano works and is played here in its 1852 version, with the additional five variations (later published by Brahms) and the third and ninth études from the 1837 edition. This really gives the listener an opportunity to hear this work in all its glory.

IRR said of Kemp’s most recent release on BIS (BISSACD1940) ‘Kempf is consistently imaginative, attentive to details, technically adroit and emotionally committed’.

Schumann's music is descriptive and poetic. He was, after Wagner, surely the most important writer of musical commentary among the musicians of his time, while his piano cycles like Papillons, Davidsbündlertänze, Carnaval, Kinderszenen and Kreisleriana couple personal feelings with poetic aspects.

For about ten years, up to op. 23, Schumann wrote exclusively for the piano; it had been his instrument from the time of his youth, an affinity he shared with his later friend Frédéric Chopin, who was born in the same year as he was.

The opus numbers of the four works on this CD follow directly upon one another, having been written in the same short period (1838/39); in spite of their differences in form, length and content, they have much in common.

The fourth installment of the first true complete recording of Schumann’s piano works. No competition exists for this compilation anywhere and previous volumes have gained great support and reviews from the media and public alike. The entire production has been supervised by Schumann expert Joachim Draheim.

Vermeulen explains his approach to Schumann: “In this recording, I have tried to approach Schumann’s metronome markings as closely as possible. “ He performs on an instrument made by Tröndlin in Leipzig between 1830 and 1935.

The final disc of the complete works for piano and piano chamber music, confirms Eric Lesage as THE specialist in Schumann’s repertoire. The harvest of outstanding reviews, for his recordings as much as for his numerous concerts across the globe, promises a brilliant future for this latest reference, which ends by the alpha and omega of his pianistic creation. It opens on the Rhine, in Mannheim, with the charming Variations on the name ‘Abegg’ , of 1830, and closes in Düsseldorf with the mysterious variations, called Geistervariationen, composed and copied out in February 1854, just before and immediately after his attempted suicide in the Rhine, leading to his permanent internment in Endenich (Bonn), facing the sacred river of the Germans…

This is the first time that these live recordings, made in the Pushkin Museum of fine Arts in December 1985, have been made available on CD. Richter performs Schumann’s Blumenstück, Concert Etude after Paganini Op. 10 No. 4 in C minor and the Piano Quintet in E flat major Op.44 together with the world renowned Borodin Quartet. Richter and Berlinskaya perform Six Impromptus for piano 4-hands Op.66.

The young Norwegian pianist Christian Ihle Hadland, a rising star internationally, makes his solo debut with a recording for Simax that pairs two of the most outstanding composers of 19th century piano music, Frédéric Chopin and Robert Schumann. Both composers are very much in the limelight this year, the 200th anniversaries of their births in 1810.

In selecting the repertoire for his debut album, Hadland wanted to focus on works by Chopin and Schumann that may not be in the constant spotlight, but still possess tremendous qualities. Some of the most elegant melodies of Chopin can be found in his Impromptus, whilst the Waldszenen of Schumann explore a profound strain of German romanticism, a fantasy-world of inns and hunters, lonely flowers, prophetic birds, shadowed valleys and haunted thickets.

26-year-old Christian Ihle Hadland is considered among the foremost Norwegian pianists today. A much sought after soloist and chamber musician, Christian is opening the Oslo Philharmonic Orchestra’s season in 2010/11, as well as touring Japan and China. He has recently become Artistic Director of Norway’s International Chamber Music Festival at Stavanger (a position he holds jointly with clarinettist Martin Fröst).