SKU: HL.14030351

ISBN 9780853605485. UPC: 884088434175. 8.5x11.75 inches.

Commissioned by Richard Deering with funds provided by the Arts Council of Great Britain and first performed by him in October 1982 in Amsterdam. The title is the same as the Schoenberg ones of 1911 and like those pieces my title is something of an understatement. They are not musically or technically undemanding as the title may perhaps suggest. In my case these pieces were in a sense sketches for my larger scale Piano Sonata of the following year. Each piece has its own essential character, but all of them are linked in the use of common pitch material. There is more than a hint of parody in the mood of the music.

SKU: BR.EB-8993

ISBN 9790004187227. 9 x 12 inches.

The three piano sonatas by Joachim Raff (1822-1882), representing his three main creative phases, occupy a special position among his more than 100 piano pieces. They reflect a significant compositional aspiration whereas Raff otherwise frequently leans towards the salon-music genre in his piano music. Raff composed the early sonata op. 14 in 1844 after his first works were positively evaluated and Felix Mendelssohn Bartholdy had encouraged him to venture a career as a composer. The Fantasie-Sonate [Fantasy Sonata] in d minor op. 168, Raff wrote in 1871 at the height of his fame as one of Germany's then most-played composers. Its dedication to Camille Saint-Saens shows his opposition to the rampant German disapproval of France and its music representatives in the wake of the Franco-Prussian war of 1870/71. The second version of the sonata op. 14, composed in the fall of 1881, had only the opus number in common with the earlier version. In this late work Raff had created an entirely new sonata. ,,Beautifully presented on cream paper, with exceptional clarity and generous spacing. The Fantasie-Sonate in D minor Op. 168, in particular, is a masterpiece which manifests both considerable power and exquisite craftsmanship. (www.pianodao.com).