SKU: HL.51481648

UPC: 196288308423. 12.25x9.25x0.11 inches.

Johannes Brahms twice chose a theme by his friend and mentor Robert Schumann as the basis for piano variations. While the Variations op. 9 were composed for piano solo, as an exception he wrote Opus 23 for a four-hand scoring. Its tender, chorale-like theme is particularly touching and was carefully chosen by Brahms: It was among Robert Schumann's last musical thoughts, which the composer, already tormented by severe delusions, believed he heard from the voices of angels. The Variations, composed in 1861, end with a kind of funeral march and can be understood as a wistful farewell to his deceased friend. The musical text is based on the New Brahms Complete Edition, thus ensuring the highest accuracy and reflecting the most current state of research. Furnished with fingerings by Andreas Groethuysen, a proven specialist for the four-hand repertoire, this Urtext edition leaves nothing to be desired.

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What I can expect from Henle Urtext editions:

• error-free, reliable musical texts based on meticulous musicological research - fingerings and bowings by famous artists and pedagogues
• preface in 3 languages with information on the genesis and history of the work 
• Critical Commentary in 1 – 3 languages with a description and evaluation of the sources and explaining all source discrepancies and editorial decisions 
• most beautiful music engraving 
• page-turns, fold-out pages, and cues where you need them 
• excellent print quality and binding 
• largest Urtext catalogue world-wide 
• longest Urtext experience (founded 1948 exclusively for Urtext editions)

SKU: HL.49047113

ISBN 9781705189269. UPC: 842819117520. 0.096 inches.

The final movement of the Sonata in A major K. 331 by Wolfgang Amadeus Mozart, the Rondo Alla Turca, is one of the most famous pianopieces of all. Once reserved for all music connoisseurs, later played by every piano student, its opening melody, alienated like a sine tone, is now omnipresent even as a mobile phone ringtone. The arrangement by Fazil Say, created as an effective encore, builds on this popularity. Mounted on the still recognizable classic basic level, typical jazz elements such as syncopation of the top tones and embellishment with chromatic blue notes, embedded in sometimes frenzied chains of sixteenth notes, are found - after the first eight bars have been presented originally. In accordance with the improvisational character, Say himself likes to perform his Alla Turca Jazz in other combinations, for example with the accompaniment of jazz singers or with an orchestra. Perhaps it is surprising that Fazil Say, who was born in Turkey and lives there when not on tour, does not trace Mozart's adaptation of genuinely Turkish music closer to its origins, since many of his compositions such as Black Earth or the Violin Sonata are characterized by a subtle touch Combination of classic-romantic tradition, Turkish folk music and jazz elements. In another Mozart arrangement, the ballet music Patara, which premiered in Vienna in 2006, but now composed on the rococo-esque (and almost equally popular) theme from the first movement of the same A major sonata, Say still has the connection denied to the Alla Turca, albeit inthe opposite direction. In distinctive chamber music instrumentation, the piano stands for Western culture, the ney flute for that of the Orient, atmospherically conveyed by sparse percussion and vocalises by a soprano.