This Is (Not) Beethoven

Arash Safaian, Sebastian Knauer & Zürcher Kammerorchester

Released on 14/08/2020 by BMG Rights Management GmbH
Main artists: Arash Safaian Sebastian Knauer Zürcher Kammerorchester
Genre: Classical

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Following on the success of their ÜberBach collaboration, pianist Sebastian Knauer and composer Arash Safaian return with This Is (Not) Beethoven, but what is it, exactly? Listen and decide for yourself: this is the interest of the thing. The artists call it a "fantasy for piano and orchestra," and indeed, one of its sources is Beethoven's Piano Sonata No. 14 in C sharp minor, Op. 27, No. 2, subtitled "quasi una fantasia." There are several others, prominently the Symphony No. 7 in A major, Op. 92, and the Piano Sonata No. 29 in B flat major, Op. 106 ("Hammerklavier"). Though it's a set of short pieces, not a fantasy in the traditional sense. A set of variations based on the Symphony No. 7 Allegretto is dispersed among the program, and the whole group of pieces might be considered variations on Beethoven. Yet they don't develop as a variation set usually does. The mood is pretty consistent from piece to piece, and the mood is Beethovenian. Knauer says that the aim was to bring Beethoven into the modern era, but the music is resolutely tonal, and the thematic material stays close to Beethoven's musical language. Safaian does not, even in the sections explicitly designated as variations, write just "variations on themes." He picks up interior motives and even distinctive passagework as well as the main themes of movements. The work is certainly an homage to Beethoven on the 250th anniversary of his birth. Listeners will take pleasure in the fragmentary bits of Beethoven in the music, passing as if in a dream, as well as in the deeper questions the music raises.

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This Is (Not) Beethoven

Arash Safaian

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Una fantasia