Heralds of Spring. Par RAFF JOSEPH JOACHIM. Joachim Raff?s 12 piano pieces Frühlingsboten op. 55, originating in 1852/53, mark a new creative start in his compositional oeuvre, in which the composer left behind his previously written and published piano works. The title of the work, translated as ?Heralds of Spring,? is multilayered: It refers not only to spring in nature as expressed in the headings of the first two pieces, ? Winterruhe [Hibernation]? and ? Frühlingsnahen [Spring?s Approach],? but the words ?Heralds of Spring? also indicate love?s spring, the blossoming of love for his future wife, the actress Doris Genast. This appears in the headings of the pieces as of no. 3, sketching the path of an imaginary couple approaching union via various annoyances. And ultimately, Raff saw in his new piano work the ?harbingers? of his future works, created under ?happy circumstances.? In Frühlingsboten Raff repeatedly demonstrates his ability to adapt idioms and compositional techniques from works by Liszt, Chopin, Mendelssohn, Schumann, and others. The pieces do nonetheless possess their own thoroughly original diction with a character spectrum just as diverse as their stylistic piano design. / Date parution : 2022-11-16/ Recueil / Piano

Par HAYDN FRANZ JOSEF. The towering composer who perfected the early symphonic form and invented the modern string quartet also left his indelible mark on the sonata. During 50 years of inspired creative effort, Haydn experimented constantly with the sonata form, adding a clear thematic structure to the tonal design inherited from earlier composers. This comprehensive new playing edition conatins 52 sonatas by the master - a treasury of keyboard compositions in which echoes of the baroque and harbingers of romanticism blend with the lucidity and elegance of 18th century classicism. Reprinted in two volumes from an authoritative Breitkopf and Hartel edition, the sonatas are arranged in a chronologicalsequence based on recent scholarship. Extremely clear and readable, with ample space for notes, this Dover edition is a must for serious pianists, students and music lovers in general. It is an excellent, inexpensive means to study and savour the inventive daring, freedom and mastery that Haydn brought to the piano sonata./ Répertoire / Piano

Par KNUSSEN OLIVER. O Hototogisu! is presented here as a typeset score with two facsimile pages from the composer’s manuscript. This exquisite ‘fragment of a Japonisme’ – premiered in 2017 and conceived as a kind of double concerto for soprano, flute and ensemble of 23 players – proved to be Oliver Knussen’s final work. The 8-minute piece couches seven exquisite haiku settings in richly evocative music which incorporates signals from Japanese theatre (particularly Kabuki). It concerns the Hototogisu (or Lesser Cuckoo), a bird widely invoked in Japanese haiku poetry of the 17th-19th centuries, where the poet listens for its arrival from the mountains both as a harbinger of summer and a voice from the land of the dead. / Scores / Répertoire / Soprano, Flûte Traversière et Ensemble De Chambre

23 Charakterstücke - leicht in beiden Instrumenten. Par GROB KARIN. / Recueil / Violoncelle et Piano