Pianist Samson Tsoy on his debut solo album, 'Inmost Heart'
The pianist Samson Tsoy makes his solo debut on record with an album for Linn, 'Inmost Heart'. Built around Brahms's Variations and Fugue on a Theme by Handel, the programme explores Brahms's fascination with the Baroque, but also how his music was later transcribed by Reger and Busoni. This Gramophone Podcast is given in association with Wigmore Hall James Jolly visited Samson at his North London home to talk about the new album, his journey from Kazakhstan to London via Moscow, and how he plans to incorporate music from the album into his concert programmes.
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27:35
Fatma Said on lieder and friendship
Soprano Fatma Said shares the closeness she feels to the world of lieder and how this has lead to her latest album on Warner Classics. She speaks to Hattie Butterworth about the element of friendship within a musicians’ professional and personal life, as well as her creative decisions throughout the album to include a number of pianists and instrumentalists, and even a male voice choir
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Pianist Dmitry Masleev on his Dies irae-themed Liszt & Rachmaninov album
Dmitry Masleev took first prize in the Piano category of the 2015 Tchaikovsky International Competition and since then has released a number of recordings. The latest, from Aparté, is a concertante collection of Liszt's Totentanz, his Rhapsodie espagnole (in a version for piano and orchestra made by Masleev's professor at the Moscow Conservatoire, Mikhail Petukhov) and Rachmaninov's Rhapsody on a Theme of Paganini. He was joined by the Svetlanov Symphony Orchestra. James Jolly, who first met Masleev during the 2019 Tchaikovsky Competition in Moscow, caught up with him again to talk about how the competition changed the course of his career, the new album and how the Dies irae theme infuses so many great classical works.
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Seong-Jin Cho on Ravel's piano music
Seong-Jin Cho, the 30-year-old pianist and winner of the 2015 International Chopin Piano Competition, has been entrusted by Deutsche Grammophon to spearhead the company's celebrations of the 150th anniversary of the birth of the great French composer, Maurice Ravel. The first release, out on January 17, contains the complete solo piano works, and the second, due on February 21, is of the two piano concertos (a live recording with the Boston Symphony Orchestra and Andris Nelsons). Gramophone's James Jolly caught up with Seong-Jin Cho just after the pianist had performed the complete solo works in a single evening in Liechtenstein to talk about Ravel's important contribution to the piano repertoire.
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James McVinnie on his new album, Dreamcatcher
Organist and pianist James McVinnie's new album 'Dreamcatcher' is a beautiful series of works by contemporary composers including Nico Muhly, John Adams, Giles Swayne, Gabriella Smith, Meredith Monk and others, all based around ideas of imagining – be that to do with memory, architecture, musical form or social justice. He joins Editor Martin Cullingford in this week's Podcast to talk through the programme, and about the sound world he's created for this captivating recording. 'Dreamcatcher' is available on the Pentatone label from next Friday, January 17.
Netherlands