SKU: BT.EMBZ20083

English-Hungarian.

Bartók's Mikrokosmos has been one of the milestones in pedagogical piano repertoire for 80 years - and yet it is also far more than a classical piano primer. These 153 piano pieces, organized in ascending order of difficulty, engage not only with technical aspects of piano playing but also with the fundamentals of composition - from Imitation and Inversion, Ostinato, and Free Variations, concerning compositional technique, to mood pieces and pieces with programmatic ideas such as Notturno, Boating, From the Diary of a Fly, or the famous Six Dances in Bulgarian Rhythm. Mikrokosmos first appeared in 1940 in six volumes. Based on volume 40 of the Bartók CompleteEdition published in 2020(Z. 15040), the present Urtext edition offers the series gathered in three volumes. This edition includes Bartók's preface, exercises, and notes written for the first edition. Furthermore, it also features a preface and comments by the editor, which not only discuss the genesis and the compositional sources but also provide performers, teachers and pupils alike, with authentic and detailed information about Bartók's notation and the specific performing problems of Mikrokosmos.

SKU: PR.140401210

ISBN 9781491114438. UPC: 680160642106. 9 x 12 inches.

Written in honor of the Béla Bartók centennial, MUSIQUE NOCTURNES is inspired by one of his most characteristic and original works, the fourth piece (by the same title), from the suite Out of Doors. Both pieces feature overlapping “night musics” – atmospheric cluster figures, sharply contrasting motifs suggesting nocturnal bird, frog, or insect sounds, and an element of human, folksong-like melody as Levinson alludes to the authentic Hungarian folksong, “Tiszán innen, Dunán túl.”.
This simple piece was written in 2015 as a birthday present for the composer’s wife, poet and fellow bird lover Nanine Valen, and is a distant sequel to Canons and Chorale, which he wrote for her in 1969. The ornithological character is an affectionate tribute as well to his teacher Olivier Messiaen. The titular birds are a highly stylized chickadee and two song sparrows.First public performance: Swarthmore College, November 13, 2016, by Marcantonio Barone, whose editorial assistance in the preparation of this edition is gratefully acknowledged. Recorded by Marcantonio Barone on Innova 948.

SKU: KP.IT81