Ferruccio Busoni: 3 Morceaux; Op 4, 5, 6. [BV 197] (Harden)

Описание: Ferruccio Dante Michelangiolo Benvenuto was an Italian composer, pianist, conductor, editor, writer, and teacher. His international career and reputation led him to work closely with many of the leading musicians, artists and literary figures of his time, and he was a sought-after keyboard instructor and a teacher of composition. He began composing in his early years in a late romantic style, but after 1907, when he published his Sketch of a New Esthetic of Music, he developed a more individual style, often with elements of atonality. His visits to America led to interest in North American indigenous tribal melodies which were reflected in some of his works. His compositions include works for piano, among them a monumental Piano Concerto, and transcriptions of the works of others, notably Johann Sebastian Bach (published as the Bach-Busoni Editions). He also wrote chamber music, vocal and orchestral works, and operas—one of which, Doktor Faust, he left unfinished when he died, in Berlin, at the age of 58.

The pianist Alfred Brendel said of Busoni's playing that it "signifies the victory of reflection over bravura" after the more flamboyant era of Liszt. He cites Busoni himself: "Music is so constituted that every context is a new context and should be treated as an 'exception'. The solution of a problem, once found, cannot be reapplied to a different context. Our art is a theatre of surprise and invention, and of the seemingly unprepared. The spirit of music arises from the depths of our humanity and is returned to the high regions whence it has descended on mankind."

Sir Henry Wood was surprised to hear Busoni playing, with two hands in double octaves, passages in a Mozart concerto written as single notes. At this, Donald Tovey proclaimed Busoni "to be an absolute purist in not confining himself strictly to Mozart's written text", that is, that Mozart himself could have taken similar liberties. The musicologist Percy Scholes wrote that "Busoni, from his perfect command over every means of expression and his complete consideration of every phrase in a composition to every other phrase and to the whole, was the truest artist of all the pianists had ever heard."

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Timestamps:

0:00 Photograph.
0:02 I. Scherzo. (Op. 4)
4:41 II. Præludium. (Op. 5)
6:52 II. Fuge. (Op. 5)
9:33 III. Scène de Ballet. (Op. 6)

Composed by Ferruccio Dante Michelangiolo Benvenuto in 1884.
Dedicated to Betty de Preleuthner
Piano: Wolf Harden

Score available on IMSLP