Czerny: "School of Velocity", Op. 299, no. 1-30

1. how you come across to it:
Bought it in Shengzhen book city

2. why this piece?
I bought it together with Op. 849 for my student. But actually I have never played them before! I have been always a lazy piano student who never practised any Czerny or Hanon.

3. (and...)
This is the missing part of my piano learning. Maybe most piano students would found Czerny uninteresting. But when I played it, I realized that although his chords are simple, but he explored many different patterns, and they could be very musical if played well. And each piece indeed helps to improve particular finger techniques. These piece can be an easier step-stone before the more difficult Chopin and Liszt etudes.

And as the student of Beethoven and the teacher of Liszt, his pieces demonstrate both the classical and early romantic style. Indeed Liszt owed a lot from him! You can find traces of Liszt's La Campella and other pieces in these exercises.

Brahms: Violin Sonata No. 3 in D minor, Op. 108 / Clarinet Quintet in B minor, Op. 115

1. how you come across to it:
Random search in HMV, dated back to my secondary school days. This violin sonata is the very first piece which drew me to Brahms.

2. why this piece?
In fact I have been trying to avoid Brahms deliberately, especially his violin sonatas, the most intimate one among his chamber music. I didn't mean to listen to him, but somehow it finds its way back to me.

3. (and...)
Brahms's music is hopelessly romantic and heart-melting as ever. He could have softened the hardest soul.

4. (also...)
If Beethoven's Kreutzer Sonata could inspire Tolstoy to write a novella, sometimes I wonder why there is no literary output based on Brahms' chamber music.

Richter + Oistrach playing III. Un poco presto e con sentimento
http://hk.youtube.com/watch?v=eX9mI0OdJrA

Jean Sibelius: Symhony No. 5

1. how you come across to it:
Watched a stunning concert of this piece in Shenzhen Concert Hall, played by Okko Kamu coducts Helsinki Philhamonic Orchestra. Then listen Alexander Gibson/LSO and Paavo Beglund/COE at home.

2. why this piece?
It's really a great piece.

3. (and...)
It seems that Finnish have their secret on playing Sibelius. I find that Berglund and Kamu have many similarities in what details should be brought out that Gibson didn't do so, although Gibson also did a great job in the recording.
BTW, I still think S7 the best symphony by Sibelius, and please find Berglund/COE's recording.


Esa-Pekka Salonen conducts Swedish Radio Symphony Orchestra

Schumann: Symphony No. 4 in D minor

1. how you come across to it:
In office.

2. why this piece?
I have never understood Schumann's music. This is the first time I realize that this is something of great passion.

3. (and...)
Thomas Zehetmair with the Northern Sinfonia. Great playing. Very lively and organic. It swept away the brick feeling that Schumann symphonies have given me.

Rachmaninov: Piano Concerto No.3

1. how you come across to it:
I think everyone is familiar to this classics, and recently I'm trapped into this piece deeply, it simply shows all the possible capacity of a piano (from massive to delicate, heroic to intimate) in the style of Romanticism, Rachmaninov makes a perfect marriage of a piano and an orchestra (from the huge forces of the last movement ending to the chamber dialogues just after the cadenza of the 1st movement).
2. why this piece?
Apart from Classic Horowitz
we can have Bronfman
3. (and...)
Andsnes (documentary)

P.S. Ashkenazy is better for score-study listening only ...

Faure: Dolly

1. how you come across to it:
Got to know this work at a friend's studio. I find this piece like a French china vase placed in a noble household. It is lovely, intimate and of course, very French and bourgeois.

2. why this piece?
Played it with Kitty at our class concert. The more I play this piece, the more I enjoy the finely crafted subtleties in the harmony, which are constructed in a very refine way.

3. (and...)
Faure wrote this piece for the daughter of his mistress at that time, Emma Bardac, who married Debussy later. She is also the mother of Chou-Chou, whom Debussy composed Children's Corner for.

By the way, I'm looking for someone to play Dolly together. Let me know if you're interested.

Jaakko Mäntyjärvi: CCCX

1. how you come across to it:
I watched that in the performance of Hannu Norjanen conducts Tapiolo Chamber Choir in Taipei International Choral Festival 2008.

2. why this piece?
It's just stunning~!
You may try this in NML, search the cat. no. NCD18, the last track Herra Jeesus jun taalla vain kanssamme on is the original title of CCCX while it is as a part of the piece Salvat 1701.
The title CCCX means hymn no. 310.

3. (and...)
I am crazy for Jaakko Mäntyjärvi now!!!!!!! The eclectic traditionalist.


http://www.englishcentre.fi/mpoy/jm.htm