Schubert’s music defined the Romantic age and Paul Lewis’s sought-after performances are coming to define the way our age hears Schubert. In barely a decade, Lewis has emerged as one of the great musical thinkers of our time, and his relationship with Schubert is at the very heart of his artistry. Now, at the climax of a two-year exploration of Schubert’s late piano music, Lewis tours the world with a series of concerts that explore the full range of Schubert’s mature genius; from deceptively simple miniatures to such groundbreaking romantic masterpieces as the Wanderer Fantasy and the late piano sonatas.

“Lewis’s approach was understated, always letting the infinite succession of melody unfold naturally. The music was allowed to speak for itself without the imposition of overly self-conscious interpretative detail. What emerged all the more clearly as a result – particularly in this sympathetic acoustic – was an acute sense of Schubert’s extraordinary harmonies, as well as the crucial milestones in his tonal landscape. The con moto movement of the Sonata in D major, D850, by turns gently lyrical and passionate, found Lewis at his compelling best, realising Schubert’s song-like nature and, with it, some of the heartbreak.” (The Guardian)

Listen to Paul Lewis play Sonata no 19 in C minor, D. 958:

Watch video: Fantasy f minor D. 940 with Imogen Cooper

Interviews:

On the Road (limelightmagazine.com.au)

On Schubert (guardian.co.uk)

Schubert-Liszt: Ave Maria performed by Sandro Russo on Liszt’s 1862 Bechstein Piano:

Schubert-Liszt: Ave Maria, piano sheet music:

Seven transcriptions of songs by Franz Schubert has been added to the sheet music library:
Schubert: Auf dem Wasser zu singen
Schubert: Ave Maria
Schubert: Der Müller und der Bach
Schubert: Der Wanderer
Schubert: Du bist die Ruh
Schubert: Gretchen am Spinnrade
Schubert: Ständchen (Horch, horch)

Find more transcriptions by Franz Liszt here:
Liszt: Transcriptions – piano sheet music to download and print

"Schubert has become even more necessary to my well-being, and I sense strongly that he is important for an audience’s well-being too."
- pianist Imogen Cooper

Imogen says: “I’m not afraid of being described as a Schubert specialist,” even though her active repertoire ranges from Bach to Thomas Adès. “He has taken up a lot of my waking time for more than 30 years. In fact, you could say that his songs and his piano music have sometimes been close to an obsession for me.” It is more than 20 years since Cooper made a live and recorded survey of all the piano music Schubert composed from early 1823 until his death in 1828 at the age of 31. “One of the reasons I’ve taken it all up again is that I feel it ten times more strongly than I did 20 years ago: the message has become more direct to me. Schubert has become even more necessary to my well-being, and I sense strongly that he is important for an audience’s well-being too.”

“Cooper’s sensitivity to the new light shed by remote keys is unfailing, and above all she tells the strange adventure of Schubert’s most tormented A minor Sonata with unerring judgment. For this account alone, the latest instalment is indispensable.” BBC Music Magazine, June 2010

“the poise of Cooper’s playing holds one breathless…Cooper’s sense of rightness of colour and her exquisite balancing of textures fully justify her reputation as one of the great Schubertians of our time.”
Sunday Times, 16th May 2010

Listen to samples at amazon.com

Watch the Master class online at:
http://performanceguides.carnegiehall.org/schubert/

Sheet music to download and print of Shubert’s Piano Sonatas

Recordings of the Six Moments Musicaux performed by David Wärn have now been published by Piano Street.

We are happy to share with you the recordings of piece no 5 and 6 from the set for free:

Moment Musical, op 94 no 5

(click play button twice to start)

Moment Musical, op 94 no 6

Piano sheet music to download of Schubert’s Wanderer Fantasy:

*** MUSICAL HOLIDAY GIFTS FROM PIANO STREET ***
Free sheet music for the pieces in the above video
(click images to open in new window):

Bach: Prelude & Fugue WTC II no 20

Bach: Prelude & Fugue WTC I no 1

Bach: Prelude & Fugue WTC II no 17

Schubert: Der Wanderer

Debussy: Reflets dans l’eau

Friedrich Gulda (1930-2000) won first prize at the International Competition in Geneva in 1946. He began going on concert tours throughout the world.
Together with Jörg Demus and Paul Badura-Skoda, Gulda formed what became known as the “Viennese troika”.

Gulda had a strong dislike of authorities like the Vienna Academy, the Beethoven Ring of which he was offered in recognition of his performances but which he refused, and even faked his own death in 1999, cementing his status as the enfant terrible among pianists. Nevertheless, Gulda is widely
regarded as one of the most outstanding piano players of the 20th century.
His piano students included Martha Argerich and the conductor Claudio Abbado. He is also remembered as an accomplished jazz-pianist, musical thinker and avant-garde artist. Although most famous for his Beethoven
interpretations, Gulda also performed the music of J.S.Bach, Mozart, Schubert, Chopin, Schumann, Debussy and Ravel.

Schubert’s Diabelli Variation
Schubert wrote one variation on the well known Waltz by Diabelli, which Beethoven based his 33 Diabelli Variations on.
Diabelli was known not only as a composer but also as a publisher. In 1819 he decided to publish a volume of variations made by several composers on a Waltz of his own.
Fifty composers responded with pieces for this publication. The idea was to make one each. However, Beethoven came with 33 and his were published in a volume of their own as 33 Variations on a Waltz by Diabelli.

The above two works by Schubert and several other pieces have now been added to the Piano Street sheet music library, including two varation works and several smaller compositions.
See the complete list for this addition.

Wanderer Fantasy, opus 15
Variation on a Waltz by Diabelli
Variations on a Theme by Hüttenbrenner
Ten Variations, D. 156
Five Piano Pieces, D. 459
Three Piano Pieces, D. 946
Piano Piece in A Major
Allegretto, D. 915
Andante in C Major, D. 29

EDIT 13 January 2008:
The audio files are no longer available
for free but will soon be added to the
Gold membership resources.

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We would like to wish you Happy Holidays with some of our new recordings for you to enjoy!

The seven new recordings below are freely available until 12 January 2009.

(The sheet music of the pieces are availabe for instant download within the Piano Street Gold membership by clicking the sheet music images.)

1. Johannes Brahms:

2. Johannes Brahms:

3. Franz Schubert:

4. Charles Mayer:

5. Matthew Camidge:

6. Samuel Maykapar

7. Anton Diabelli:

This collection of four Impromptus starts and concludes with pieces in the same key (F-minor) which is one of the reasons for the speculations by Robert Schumann that parts of this opus was originally intended as a sonata (although refuted by some contemporary musicologists) but was instead published as separate pieces in order to increase the sales potential.

Schubert: Impromptu, Opus 142 No 1
A dramatic, recitativo-like introduction followed by the second theme hidden in a 16th notes texture set us in a mood for a quite large scale piece. The middle section is very peaceful featuring unique pianistic effects. The structure of the first Impromtu can be interpreted as a sonata form without a development section, supporting the view of the four Impromptus Opus 142 as movements of a single sonata.

Schubert: Impromptu, Opus 142 No 2

This well known minuet-like Impromptu has a main section consisting of a simple, well-balanced melody with chordal accompaniment. A D-flat major section featuring an arpeggiated texture forms the Trio (middle section in minuet form).
The opening bars of the melody are highly reminiscent of a similar theme, from the opening of Beethoven’s Sonata op 26.

Schubert: Impromptu, Opus 142 No 3

The charming third Impromptu is a theme with five variations. Shubert has used this theme twice before, in the incidental music composed for the play Rosamunde (Chézy, 1823) and in the slow movement of his A-minor String Quartet.

Schubert: Impromptu, Opus 142 No 4

The opus concludes with one of Schubert’s most brilliant and rhytmically vital works, a quick 3/8 tempo piece containg interesting hemiola effects, virtuosic passagework as well as surprising modulations which take the piece quite far from its main key of F minor.
The impressive coda influenced by Hungarian rhythms further heightens the drama in this already intense piece which is finished off by an astonishing six octaves descending scale through the entire tonal space.