Mankell / Nystroem / German State Philharmonic - Piano Concertos - COMPACT DISCS [CD]

Not a CD. now included. With instructional book.

Mozart's piano concertos form a set that is not just exceptional but absolutely unique in the history of music from No. 9 to No. 27, all are definitive masterpieces. According to H.C. Robbins Landon, an eminent specialist in the composer's life and work, 'It is above all their immense stylistic diversity that places Mozart's piano concertos above and beyond those of his contemporaries'. What these scores also share is their position at a crossroads for strongly impacting influences that of the symphony, encouraging Mozart to make lavish use of the orchestra; the wind bands of the Imperial court, shaping his enhanced role for the woodwinds; and the influence of the opera, whose styles he worked into these concertos, often treating the dialogue between piano and orchestra as if they were stage characters. In this new recording, Eric Le Sage is joined by the Gävle Symfoniorkester to perform the 17th and 24th concertos for piano and orchestra by the Salzburg composer.

Edvard Grieg first met Percy Grainger in London in 1906 and the two became good friends, Grieg inviting the 'Young Apollo' to spend the summer of 1907 with him at Troldhaugen where they revised the famous Piano Concerto in A minor. Their alterations resulted in the last edition Inchsanctioned by Grieg himselfInch, a version which enhances clarity and prevents undesirable self-indulgence from the performers. Norwegian composer Helge Evju's Piano Concerto takes up the challenge to compose a work based on incomplete concerto fragments by Grieg, creating a romantic and beautiful companion concerto full of 'noble passion'.