The Complete Duos / Opus 100 by Pieter Wispelwey / Paolo Giacometti

Franz Schubert, Johannes Brahms

Pieter Wispelwey / Paolo Giacometti

The Complete Duos / Opus 100

Format: CD
Label: Evil Penguin
UPC: 0608917720822
Catnr: EPRC 0022
Release date: 04 November 2016
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Label
Evil Penguin

UPC
0608917720822

Catalogue number
EPRC 0022

Release date
04 November 2016

"(...) At any rate, this is a polished and musically imaginative program, played and recorded with warmth. (...)"

ARG, 20-3-2017

Album

Artist(s)

Composer(s)

Press

About the album

The summer of 1886 was one of the most prolific in the life of Johannes Brahms. The alpine grandeur of Lake Thun and Brahms’ buoyant holiday mood conjured up so many melodies that he declared he was “afraid to step on them”. In a few weeks’ time, Brahms produced two of his major chamber works, the Cello Sonata op. 99 and the Violin Sonata op. 100, that suits the cello delightfully. These chamber icons are aptly coupled to Schubert’s blissfully uplifting Sonata D 574. Cello virtuoso Pieter Wispelwey is at once playful and profound in these summer works, and his interpretation is, from now on, open to debate in The Interpretation Room.

Opus 100, alweer het derde deel van The Complete Duos met werken van Johannes Brahms en Franz Schubert, zo prachtig uitgevoerd door cellist Pieter Wispelwey en pianist Paolo Giacometti. En opnieuw een album dat luid geprezen wordt door de critici. Zoals het blad Luister vermeldt: "Dit tweetal laat de luisteraar zo dichtbij komen dat hij of zij kan wegzinken in de samenklank en met hen van donker naar licht kruipt."

Platform voor interpretatiekwesties

Met dit deel wil Wispelwey meer dan zijn visie als kunstenaar uitdragen. Hij speelt met het idee een platform in te richten waar interpretatievraagstukken aan bod kunnen komen. Hij mist de uitwisseling, de wederzijdse bevruchting. Hij wil zijn collega-interpreten in een (virtueel) debat betrekken. Muziek is niet statisch. Een uitvoering varieert met elke plek en bij elke gelegenheid, uitvoeringstradities veranderen, slijten af, maar worden ook opgefrist. Pieter: "Het zou gezond zijn als wij uitvoerders onze mening konden verkondigen, onze twijfels en vragen, overtuigingen en obsessies konden delen. Hoe dan ook meer dan nu het geval is."

Begeesterde werken van Brahms gekoppeld aan verrukkelijk stuk van Schubert

Pieters celloversie van Brahms' tweede Vioolsonate op. 100 is een wereldpremière, maar in het repertoire van de componist neemt het stuk ook een bijzondere plek in. Brahms schreef het in Thun in de Zwitserse Alpen in de zomer van 1886, een van de productiefste periodes van zijn leven. In slechts een paar weken tijd wist Brahms twee van zijn belangrijkste kamerwerken te schrijven: de Vioolsonate Op. 100, die haast nog beter past bij de cello, en de Cellosonate Op. 99. In zijn vakantiestemming, overweldigd door de omgeving, het prachtige weer en barstensvol creatieve ideeën zou Brahms gezegd hebben dat de streek “zo vol melodieën zat dat je moest opletten dat je er niet op ging staan”.

En dat hoor je in Brahms' iconen van de kamermuziek die in deze opname treffend samengaan met Schuberts aantrekkelijke Sonate voor Viool en Piano D 574. Zoals Pieter Wispelwey memoreert: "Die onweerstaanbare openingsmelodie! De verrukkingen van dit stuk zijn ontelbaar, alle cellisten moeten dit spelen. Natuurlijk is het een beetje een uitdaging. Ik zou de kwaliteiten van deze sonate oneindig kunnen blijven roemen, maar laat ik volstaan met te zeggen hoe heerlijk het is deze muziek te spelen!"
Lees vooral ook het cd-boekje waarin Pieter vertelt over alle ins en outs en zijn beweegredenen waarom en hoe hij tot deze magnifieke opname kwam.

Uitzonderlijke artiesten
Wispelwey en Giacometti worden door American Record Guide “uitzonderlijk fantasievolle en gepassioneerde artiesten” genoemd en Sunday Times roemt hun partnerschap dat opnames en concerten opleverde die het blad als “fascinerend, provocerend, haast pervers” beschrijft. Een eerder Brahmsproject kreeg van BBC Music Magazine het label “sensationeel” mee omwille van de “wonderlijke verbeeldingskracht en het brede toongamma”.

Der Sommer des Jahres 1886 war einer der produktivsten im Leben von Johannes Brahms. Die alpine Erhabenheit des Thunersees und Brahms' heitere Urlaubsstimmung riefen so viele Melodien hervor, dass er „aufpassen muss, nicht daraufzutreten“. In wenigen Wochen schuf Brahms zwei seiner bedeutendsten Kammerwerke, die Cellosonate Op. 99 und die Violinsonate Op. 100, die dem Cello erfreulich gut steht. Diese Ikonen der Kammermusik sind hier passend gepaart mit Schuberts selig-erhebender Sonate D 574. Cellovirtuose Pieter Wispelwey zeigt sich in diesen Sommerstücken zugleich verspielt und tiefgreifend und seine Interpretation steht von jetzt an in The Interpretation Room zur Diskussion.

Artist(s)

Pieter Wispelwey (cello)

Pieter Wispelwey is equally at ease on the modern or period cello. His acute stylistic awareness, combined with a truly original interpretation and a phenomenal technical mastery, has won the hearts of critics and public alike in repertoire ranging from JS Bach to Schnittke, Elliott Carter and works composed for him.
Pieter Wispelwey enjoys chamber music collaborations and regular duo partners include pianists Cédric Tiberghien and Alasdair Beatson and he appears as a guest artist with a number of string quartets including the Australian String Quartet.
Wispelwey’s career spans five continents and he has appeared as soloist with many of the world’s leading orchestras including the Boston Symphony, Dallas Symphony, Tokyo Philharmonic, Sydney Symphony, London Philharmonic, Gewandhaus Orchester Leipzig, Danish National Radio Symphony and Camerata Salzburg. Conductor collaborations include Ivan Fischer, Esa-Pekka Salonen, Herbert Blomstedt, Yannick Nézet-Séguin, Jeffrey Tate, Kent Nagano, Sir Neville Marriner, Philippe Herreweghe, Ton Koopman and Sir Roger Norrington.
With regular recital appearances in London (Wigmore Hall), Paris (Châtelet, Louvre), Amsterdam (Concertgebouw, Muziekgebouw), Brussels (Bozar), Berlin (Konzerthaus), Milan (Societta del Quartetto), Buenos Aires (Teatro Colon), Sydney (The Utzon Room), Los Angeles (Walt Disney Hall) and New York (Lincoln Center), Wispelwey has established a reputation as one of the most charismatic recitalists on the circuit.
In 2012 Wispelwey celebrated his 50th birthday by embarking on a project showcasing the Bach Cello Suites. He recorded the complete Suites for the third time. A major strand of his recital performances is his performances of the complete suites during the course of one evening, an accomplishment that has attracted major critical acclaim throughout Europe and the US. Pieter Wispelwey plays on a 1760 Giovanni Battista Guadagnini cello and a 1710 Rombouts baroque cello.

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Paolo Giacometti (piano)

Pianist Paolo Giacometti performs all over the world as a soloist and as a chamber musician, both on period and on modern instruments. He was born in Milan, Italy in 1970, but has been living in the Netherlands from his early childhood. Jan Wijn and Gyorgy Sebök were important sources of inspiration and had a significant influence on his musical education. Paolo Giacometti has won many prizes at both national and international competitions. He has played with renowned orchestras under distinguished conductors such as Frans Brüggen, Kenneth Montgomery, Laurent Petitgirard, Michael Tilkin and Jaap van Zweden. Apart from his activities as a soloist, Paolo Giacometti’s love for chamber music has resulted in a successful co-operation with leading musicians such as Pieter Wispelwey, Gordon Nikolich,...

Pianist Paolo Giacometti performs all over the world as a soloist and as a chamber musician, both on period and on modern instruments.

He was born in Milan, Italy in 1970, but has been living in the Netherlands from his early childhood. Jan Wijn and Gyorgy Sebök were important sources of inspiration and had a significant influence on his musical education.

Paolo Giacometti has won many prizes at both national and international competitions. He has played with renowned orchestras under distinguished conductors such as Frans Brüggen, Kenneth Montgomery, Laurent Petitgirard, Michael Tilkin and Jaap van Zweden. Apart from his activities as a soloist, Paolo Giacometti’s love for chamber music has resulted in a successful co-operation with leading musicians such as Pieter Wispelwey, Gordon Nikolich, Alois Brandhofer, Janine Jansen, Bart Schneemann and Viktoria Mullova. Paolo Giacometti is a much sought-after musician at chamber music festivals in Europe, Canada and the United States. He has performed in concert halls all over the world including the Concertgebouw (Amsterdam), Teatro Colon (Buenos Aires), Wigmore Hall (London), Théâtre du Châtelet (Paris) and Seoul Arts Centre (South Korea).

Giacometti's impressive discography has been widely acclaimed by the international press. His recordings include Rossini’s complete piano works, a remarkable project that started in 1998 and was completed in 2007. In Rossini’s homeland critics say: "... Rossini has finally found his pianist ...". His recording of the Dvorák and Schumann piano concertos have been acclaimed by Gramophone as "... one of the best concerto disks I have heard in a long while ...".

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Composer(s)

Franz Schubert

Franz Peter Schubert was an Austrian composer. Schubert already died before his 32nd birthday, but was extremely prolific during his lifetime. His output consists of over six hundred secular vocal works (mainly Lieder), seven complete symphonies, sacred music, operas, incidental music and a large body of chamber and piano music. Appreciation of his music while he was alive was limited to a relatively small circle of admirers in Vienna, but interest in his work increased significantly in the decades following his death. Felix Mendelssohn, Robert Schumann, Franz Liszt, Johannes Brahms and other 19th-century composers discovered and championed his works. Today, Schubert is ranked among the greatest composers of the late Classical and early Romantic eras and is one of the most frequently performed composers of the early nineteenth century.
It was in the genre of the Lied that Schubert made his most indelible mark. Prior to Schubert's influence, Lieder tended toward a strophic, syllabic treatment of text, evoking the folksong qualities engendered by the stirrings of Romantic nationalism. Schubert expanded the potentialities of the genre like no other composer before.

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Johannes Brahms

Johannes Brahms was a German composer and pianist. Born in Hamburg into a Lutheran family, Brahms spent much of his professional life in Vienna, Austria. His reputation and status as a composer is such that he is sometimes grouped with Johann Sebastian Bach and Ludwig van Beethoven as one of the "Three Bs" of music, a comment originally made by the nineteenth-century conductor Hans von Bülow.
Brahms composed for symphony orchestra, chamber ensembles, piano, organ, and voice and chorus. A virtuoso pianist, he premiered many of his own works. He worked with some of the leading performers of his time, including the pianist Clara Schumann and the violinist Joseph Joachim (the three were close friends). Many of his works have become staples of the modern concert repertoire. Brahms, an uncompromising perfectionist, destroyed some of his works and left others unpublished.
Brahms has been considered, by his contemporaries and by later writers, as both a traditionalist and an innovator. His music is firmly rooted in the structures and compositional techniques of the Classical masters. While many contemporaries found his music too academic, his contribution and craftsmanship have been admired by subsequent figures as diverse as Arnold Schoenberg and Edward Elgar. The diligent, highly constructed nature of Brahms's works was a starting point and an inspiration for a generation of composers. Within his meticulous structures is embedded, however, a highly romantic nature.

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Press

(...) At any rate, this is a polished and musically imaginative program, played and recorded with warmth. (...)
ARG, 20-3-2017

These two let the listener come so close that he or she can sink into the harmony and with them crawls from darkness to light.
Luister, 03-2-2017

...The venture to perform these works on cello is successful induced by a sensitive musicality of the artists.
Fono Forum, 17-1-2017

Diapason - 11/01/2017
Diapason, 11-1-2017

Besides one Brahms Sonata originally written for the cello, this CD offers two sonatas by Brahms and Schubert composed for violin and piano in transcriptions for the cello. They certainly bring new aspects to the works. Wispelwey and Giacometti concur completely and deliver compelling performances.
Pizzicato, 04-1-2017

Interview with Pieter Wispelwey in Luister "Completely dedicated to the cello"
Luister, 01-11-2016

Cello virtuoso Pieter Wispelwey is at once playful and profound in these summer works, and his interpretation is, from now on, open to debate in The Interpretation Room.
EOS Classical News Australia, 17-10-2016

Knack - 14/09/2016
Knack, 14-9-2016