“13 Ways of Looking at the Goldberg” is a set of new pieces inspired by the aria of the Goldbergs, the piece that is the subject of the original variations themselves. Twelve composers were commissioned to write these solo piano works by the Gilmore International Keyboard Festival in 2004, where they were originally played by the pianist Gilbert Kalish. No […]

The Moscow Conservatory piano school enjoys pride of place among Russia’s musical institutions. Its outstanding graduates have included Rachmaninov, Scriabin, Medtner, Richter, Gilels, Ashkenazy and Pletnev. Yet while their mastery transcends any process of formal teaching, behind these great names lies a teaching process whose workings are little known to the outside world – except in occasional publications such as […]

Alan Walker’s three-volume biography of Franz Liszt, which took him 25 years to complete, has been very influential. Common adjectives attached to the work include “monumental” and “magisterial” and it is said to have “unearthed much new material and provided a strong stimulus for further research”. Walker himself says that when he found, as a BBC producer compiling notes for […]

An exclusive interview with the just recently Diapason d’Or awarded Stephen Hough. Being active in the social media, Piano Street’s Patrick Jovell entered and won pianist Stephen Hough’s Haiku contest on Twitter. As Patrick is a resident of Stockholm and the two-tickets-recital-prize was for a Hough concert in Sydney (on Liszt’s birthday the 22nd October, incidentally), Patrick asked Stephen for […]

Super Mario – The Czerny Studies of Our Time? Are there any pianists out there who have never played studies by Czerny as part of their training? Probably not many. It is a fact that the technical and stylistic formulas necessary for playing the masterpieces of Haydn, Mozart, Beethoven and other classical composers can be developed by playing Czerny’s studies. […]

Piano Street’s monthly series of hand picked piano related links. Classical music linked to high intelligence Zimerman and Bernstein in Beethoven’s 3rd PC World Premiere of Liszt’s Piano Sonata in B minor for Solo Violin Listen to Ligeti’s Studies and Bach’s Goldberg Variations – Aspen Recital with Jeremy Denk Music training enhances children’s verbal intelligence Liszt’s Piano Sonata in B […]

To celebrate Franz Liszt’s 200th birthday, the Liszt Competition Utrecht organized a unique concert at the Vredenburg Concert Hall. The organization made a huge effort to bring out the best of 25 years of Liszt Competition history: all nine 1st prize winners were gathered here to play some of their beloved composer’s less familiar works. Some pianists shared the stage […]

The 3-D Piano Method is a 6-DVD series on piano teaching and playing, produced by artist-teacher Fred Karpoff. It attempts to describe the graceful, efficient usage of the whole body to play the piano in three-dimensions, as opposed to tenets such as “making all the fingers the same length,” “thumb-under” scales, “high” fingers, and using opposable muscles simultaneously, with curled […]

Today, October 22 2011, marks the 200th birthday of Franz Liszt, the greatest piano virtuoso of his time, inventor of the modern piano recital and one of the most influential composers of the 19th century. Piano Street here presents a collection of material and links to resources for you to enjoy in order to commemorate the great Franz Liszt. Happy […]

Piano Street’s monthly series of hand picked piano related links. Murray Perahia’s album of Brahms’ Handel Variations receives the Instrumental award Jean-Efflam Bavouzet’s album of Concertante piano works receives the Concerto award Glenn Gould would have loved the Internet Have you heard Charlie Albright? All you need to know about the Tchaikovsky competition Chopin rescues Nikita Magaloff from oblivion? Music […]

Dreamer, poet, radical, and visionary, Franz Schubert was a composer who stood between worlds. In his short life, he wrote music as epic as Beethoven and as perfect as Mozart; music that could bubble with life and joy and yet probe the darkest depths of the human soul – or distil both experiences into pure, haunting beauty. Schubert’s music defined […]

Piano Street’s hand picked piano related links collected during August 2011. Kirill Gerstein’s Classical And Jazz Conundrum Awesome piano playing: Lady Gaga Plays and Sings Paparazzi Hear Yuja Wang in Rach 2 from Verbier until October 31 Ingolf Wunder’s Chopin Recital on DG Check out BBC Proms – Episodes coming up Freedom of Expression Try the new Tchaikovsky Competition 2011 […]